Sierra Club
Redwood Chapter Newsletter
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North Group Report Diane Fairchild Beck | |
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South Spit Management Plan The South Spit of Humboldt Bay has been managed so well under the Bureau of Land Management's three-year Interim Management Plan (IMP) that it is hard to find fault - well almost. Driving out on a sunny April afternoon, one found wildflowers beginning to bloom and a good number of egrets and great blue herons in the many seasonal wetlands. Numerous motor vehicles were parked at the base of Table Bluff and near the South Jetty. But the narrow beach and dunes over the four-and-a-half miles between the two parking areas to the west of the county road were mainly unfrequented and wild, where the scars from past abuse by all-terrain vehicles are gradually disappearing. The only flaw evident in the IMP, and one that is being carried over to the new Management Plan, is that BLM is proposing to continue to allow motor vehicles to drive on the waveslope. And that flaw is significant. Except for some carefully permitted uses, there is no good reason whatever to allow motor vehicles on beaches, where most people come to kick back or saunter along above the surf. Excluding either ends of the road, there are seven small parking areas along the road where paths lead through the dunes to open sand - five of which are but from 500 to 1,000 feet from the beach. BLM has taken pains to create habitat for the threatened western snowy plover, clearing out 20 acres of dune grass, and to provide protection behind symbolic fencing in this area. Vehicles are not supposed to drive in front of the cleared plover area but they did that afternoon in April, as well as on the beach up to the grass in other areas. |
The scoping comment period on the 20-year Management Plan closed on May 19, but BLM will accept letters and emails: Robert Wick, Bureau of Land Management, 1695 Heindon Road, Arcata, CA 95521; rwick@ca.blm.gov. Balloon Tract: Marina Center Big Box Project The City of Eureka should be ashamed of pushing this project on the public by fast-tracking a zoning change from "public" to allow the private development of a Big Box project - without ever having considered the wishes of local residents or the wider community. The Marina Center Project is way out of scale for downtown and will overwhelm it. The city's own commissioned economic analysis recommended a "no-build scenario" in 1999, when a Wal-Mart was under consideration for the Balloon Tract. This 38-acre tract of land adjacent to the waterfront is highly contaminated with heavy metals and hydrocarbons which the project's promoters and Union Pacific propose merely to cap over, allowing the toxic stew to leach into the bay into the distant future. For information and a link to a Petition to Save the Eureka Waterfront, check out balloontrackwatch.com. Vote June 6:
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