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Air Quality in Yellowstone National Park On February 20, 2003, the Bush Administration announced its proposal to lower standards for the protection of Yellowstone National Park. The decision would allow continued snowmobile use in the Park despite clear impacts on air quality, wildlife, human health, and natural quiet - the very qualities that make Yellowstone unique and special. The Administration's move to allow continued snowmobiling overturns an earlier decision by the Park Service that sought to phase out the machines all together in order to fulfill its legal responsibility of protecting our country's oldest national park. In keeping with its mandate to leave the park unimpaired for future generations of Americans, the Park Service announced in January of 2001 that it would gradually eliminate the use of snowmobiles in favor of quieter and less-polluting transportation alternatives. Snowcoaches, having operated in the park since 1963, offer not only a cleaner but also a more visitor-friendly alternative to accessing Yellowstone in winter. The Park Service's original decision to phase out snowmobile use was based on more than a decade of scientific studies, 360,000 comments from the American public which supported the phase-out by a 4-to-1 margin, and executive orders from the Nixon and Reagan administrations. The Bush administration's decision to overturn the Park Service's phase-out of snowmobiles not only ignores the will of the American public but sets a dangerous precedent, lowering the standards of protection for America's most treasured lands, wildlife, and visitor safety. How snowmobiles harm the park Photo: Rangers in oxygen masks at Yellowstone National Park. Photo courtesy Tom Murphy; used with permission. Up to Top HOME | Email Signup | About Us | Contact Us | Terms of Use | © 2008 Sierra Club