America's National Park System by Lary M. Dilsaver

Author:Lary M. Dilsaver [Dilsaver, Lary M.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers
Published: 2016-06-15T00:00:00+00:00

RECOMMENDATIONS

This Committee has stated that in its opinion the National Park Service must manage to some degree the lands which fall within the National Park System. The Committee has stated further that the management of any enterprise cannot be effective unless the objectives of the enterprise are clearly defined and well understood, and plans are devised to accomplish the objectives.

Plans must be based on information of the resources (inventory) of the activity, on its problems, and on its relation with other similar activities; and they must be implemented by adequate and competent personnel, properly organized, motivated, and supported financially.

Research is an essential part of the program outlined above and its use a necessity in each of the steps. These elementary principles apply to the national parks as well as to a business or any other organized activity.

The Committee has based its recommendations on these considerations, as well as on its acquaintance with the parks and their problems and begs leave to submit the following:

1. The objectives or purposes of each national park should be defined.

COMMENT: Each national park was established because of the potential esthetic, educational, scientific and cultural values of its natural history and/or its human history. The features of a park which make the values possible of attainment should be carefully defined to serve as the basis for operational management. They should be preserved and restored, where necessary, and provisions made for their proper enjoyment and use by the people. The objectives should exclude the use of the national parks for amusement or such mass recreation as requires elaborate facilities or extensive and/or artificial modification of the natural features of a park. The Committee endorses, in this respect, the conclusion of the report: “Wildlife Management in the National Parks.” Zoning of a national park into, for example, natural and undisturbed areas, naturalistic areas, public use areas and Park Service facility areas is suggested.

2. Inventory and mapping of the natural history resources of each park should be made.

COMMENT: Such an inventory should cover the past as well as the present, and include information on topography, geology, climate, water regime, soil types, flora and fauna and natural communities. Mapping, including aerial maps, should cover species distributions, natural communities, land use, archeology and such other mappable features as may be of importance in the park.

An inventory serves as a basis for judging changes, good or bad, in the condition of a park, supplies the information necessary for interpreting the area to the public, and is essential for proper operational management, as well as for further research.

3. A distinction should be made between administration, operational management, and research management.

COMMENT: Research is essential to solve problems of operational management whether the latter concerns preservation, restoration, interpretation or the use of the parks by the public. Administration, the management of research and the management of operations require somewhat different though well recognized administrative procedures. In most situations, the following steps are involved:

1) Identification and definition of the problem or situation;

2) Research, or fact finding,

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