Deep South Regional Partnership E-news

08/31/05

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Join Us! Learn, Volunteer, Educate

Come and help us in protecting our National Forest, the Appalachian Trail and the French Broad River from invasive exotic plants that are threatening the biodiversity of our special natural resources. Learn the impacts of invasive exotic plants, how to control them in your own yards, plant identification as well as have some FUN with a diverse group of volunteers. We will be removing invasive exotics along the French Broad River by pulling, cutting or chain sawing (for those who are certified) in the Hot Springs area.

When: Join us for one or more of the following days: September 23, 24, and 25, September 29, 30 and October 1, Join us 8 hours or more and receive a T-shirt! Come for PRIZES & GIVEAWAYS! We will have coffee and donuts ready for you at 7:45am! Training begins at 8am. Volunteers are asked to donate 8 hours of time. If you prefer, half-day options are available.

What we will provide: · Training and identification on the TOP 12 UNWANTED plants · Methods of control · Safety training · Training on all tools · An opportunity to practice removal techniques · Snacks, coffee, donuts and lots of water! SIGN ME UP! For Further Questions and Registration, Contact: Julie Judkins at ATC, Phone: 828-254-3708, Email: jjudkins@appalachiantrail.org  Julie Judkins, Program Assistant & Office Manager for the Southern Regional Office, 160A Zillicoa Street, P.O. Box 2750, Asheville, NC 28802, 828-254-3708, 828-254-3754 FAX jjudkins@appalachiantrail.org 

Great Old Broads to protest proposed North Shore Road By Becky Johnson • Smokey Mountain News • Staff Writer

The Great Old Broads for Wilderness are coming to Bryson City in September for a week of hiking and camping and protesting against the proposed North Shore Road that would traverse the southern edge of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

The Great Old Broads are a national group of mostly senior citizen women with the mission of protecting wilderness areas for their grandchildren’s generation.

Every year the Great Old Broads for Wilderness bring attention to wild areas in need of protection by “Broadwalking” across them. Broads from throughout the country gather together with local wilderness advocates to learn about and hike over threatened lands.

The Great Old Broads — far from the stereotypical radical environmentalist — say they are uniquely positioned to capture public attention for threatened areas.

“We’re an anomaly in the environmental activist area. Our approach in this endeavor is the use of a sense of humor and our well-aged grace,” according to the Great Old Broads web site. “As life-long nurturers and care-givers, the Great Old Broads’ approach is one of perseverance and determination, rather than militancy and contentiousness.”

The Great Old Broads for Wilderness formed in 1989 to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Wilderness Act. While the group is predominantly comprised of older women, there are Broads of all ages and both genders in every state.

The Broadwalk will be held Sept. 22 through 26. The Great Old Broads will camp outside the park in the Deep Creek area. In addition to hiking the area, speakers from the community, environmental groups and the park service will talk about the proposed road and its history.

The proposed road would be about 25-miles and would be inside the southern edge of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park along the shore of Fontana Lake. A road once connected Bryson City to Tennessee but portions were flooded when Fontana Lake was created in the 1940s. The government promised to build the road back but never has, leaving Bryson City hemmed in by public lands. Congressman Charles Taylor, R-Brevard, got $16 million to do the extensive environmental studies that are required for building a road through a national park. The park service will make a yeah or nay decision on the road based on the studies, which could come out this fall. Taylor, a road supporter, is chair of the committee that controls the park service’s budget and could influence the decision. Regardless of the park service’s decision, however, Congress would still have to appropriate the money to build the road and environmental groups are already preparing their lawsuits to stop it.

The Broads plan to hold a media event to express what they call outrage over the consideration of the road through the park.

Anyone is welcome to join the Broadwalk. The cost is $125. For more information call 970.385.9577 or go to www.greatoldbroads.org .

ATC favors "Monetary Settlement" on North Shore Issue

Great Smoky Mountains National Park North Shore Road EIS. Several years ago, U.S. Rep. Charles Taylor (R-N.C.), chair of the Natural Resources Committee, arranged for funding that directs the staff of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park (GRSM) to prepare an environmental impact statement (EIS) concerning the "North Shore Road" (NSREIS). The NSREIS evaluates alternatives to satisfy obligations on the part of the United States stemming from a 1943 agreement between Swain County, N.C., the Tennessee Valley Authority, the state of North Carolina, and the U.S. Department of the Interior (for the NPS). Background information on this issue and process is available at <http://www.northshoreroad.info/>, the park’s Web site for the NSREIS process.

One NSREIS alternative proposes construction of a road along the north shore of Fontana Lake between Bryson City, N.C., and Fontana Dam. That alternative, if built, will have significant negative impacts on the A.T., including a significant increase in noise in an otherwise quiet environment; significant visual impacts to the viewshed of the A.T. as seen from along approximately ten miles of the Trail, including large and numerous road cuts and lengthy bridges; a significant decrease in the wilderness experience provided by the A.T. through diminishment of the largest area managed as Wilderness that the A.T. passes through from Georgia to Maine; an increase in use of the A.T. associated with improved access to trails on the north shore of Fontana Lake; and significant safety issues as a result of co-alignment of the A.T. with the new road for up to 1.5 miles. Construction of this road is estimated by the NSREIS to take up to 15 years and cost $299 million to $374 million (depending upon surfacing).

Instead, ATC has been on record from the beginning of the process as favoring the “monetary settlement” alternative. That alternative satisfies the purpose of the project because it will satisfy all obligations on the part of the United States that presently exist as a result of the Memorandum of Agreement of July 30, 1943, among DOI, TVA, Swain County, and the state. That alternative satisfies the need of the project by resulting in a determination that it is not environmentally, scenically, recreationally, culturally, or financially feasible to complete the road. The monetary settlement provides for a payment to Swain County, currently projected at $52 million ($1.3 million owed by the United States in 1943, in 2005 dollars.). Those funds would be placed in trust with the interest available to Swain County.

Of the five alternatives under consideration in the NSREIS, only the two described above satisfy the U.S. obligation to Swain County. The Swain County Commission has voted in favor of the monetary settlement, which also is favored by Governor Easley and state agencies.

The groups planning strategy for opposition to the North Shore Road (including ATC) determined it would be useful to get a large turn-out of monetary-settlement advocates at a final public meeting, to counter the pro-road group. ATC consented to explore the idea. After discussions between the regional office and headquarters, it was decided ATC would work with NPCA, the Sierra Club, SELC, WNCA, Swain County, and others to promote a “show-me” hike and encourage attendance at the February 22 final NPS public meeting concerning the NSREIS in Bryson City. ATC mailed background information to 600 western North Carolina members and e-mailed all five southern A.T. clubs, inviting participation in the hike (from the end of the “Road To Nowhere” into the undisturbed GRSM backcountry) and public meeting. About 18 of the 80 or so participants who attended the meeting came in response to the ATC appeal—a very good three-percent response! The chair of the Swain County Commission addressed the group, the group attracted some television air-time (no mention of ATC), and a good time was had by all. Though this partnership effort was successful, this type effort would have a better cost-benefit ratio if ATC were able to reach its members via e-mail.

Staff members from the southern regional office will remain engaged with the issue. They have provided formal comments for the latest round of input, having shared drafts with Deep South A.T. clubs. ATC is working with other national groups and Swain County to plan strategically for the very important response to the draft EIS, which will be released for public comment in the fall. ATC will also play a much more active role by engaging more people from the A.T. community and elsewhere in the issue through coverage in the ATN, on ATC’s Web site, perhaps with a “press blitz,” and through information displays, such as at the joint display under planning with other conservation groups for ATC’s upcoming biennial membership conference. ATC Comments on North Shore EIS

Atlanta Journal-Constitution

I-3 opposition lines road to proposed interstates

http://www.ajc.com/search/content/news/stories/0805/22interstate.html 

Tom Baxter

Published on: 08/22/05

Opposition lines road to proposed interstates

Robbinsville, N.C. — This far-western corner of North Carolina is home to an assortment of folks who have only a few things in common. One of them is a deepening opposition to an interstate highway project that has been proposed as a fix for Atlanta's traffic problems and a boon to rural development.

"This is a small area dedicated mostly to naturalists and motorcyclists. The naturalists stay off the roads, and the motorcyclists stay out of the woods," said Ben Steinberg, who handles public relations for the Deal's Gap Motorcycle Court.

It's one of several businesses along U.S. 129 that cater to the bikers who have been coming here from around the world since the early 1930s to ride the Tail of the Dragon, a tortuously twisted 11-mile stretch of the road that skirts the southwest corner of the Great Smoky Mountains National Park.

U.S. 129 is in one of the proposed paths of I-3, which would connect Savannah with Knoxville. Congress earlier this month appropriated $1.2 million in the federal highway bill to study the feasibility of building I-3 and a companion road, I-14, which would run from Savannah to Natchez, Miss.

Steinberg opposes I-3, dismayed at the thought of what he calls "the equivalent of Mecca" for bikers being four-laned and straightened.

A couple of miles away, as the crow flies, horticulturist Robin Suggs raises black cohosh, boneset, false unicorn root and a couple of dozen other native plants on a 32-acre farm — medicinal herbs that are difficult to grow but thrive here. He also worries that the interstate and the development that would come with it could play havoc in an area where the rugged topography and weather have helped create one of the most biodiverse spots on the continent.

"At what cost does this type of progress come, and is it really progress?" Suggs asked.

Backers: Roads biofriendly

But John Stone, spokesman for Rep. Charles Norwood (R-Ga.), argues that the roads would actually help the environment. On a typical summer day, he said, the air quality in the Smokies is already worse than Atlanta's, in part because winds carry the fumes of Atlanta's traffic jams northward to the mountains.

He and other highway supporters contend that building the highways would untangle the interstate spider's web, which has Atlanta at its center. It would make it feasible for the first time to drive via interstate highway from Augusta to Savannah, or Chicago to Florida, without negotiating the Atlanta maze.

"All the traffic coming through our state is flushed through [I-] 285 every day at rush hour," Stone said.

So far, there's no formal research to back the supporters' claims about the impact the interstates could have on metro Atlanta. That's one of the issues the feasibility study is supposed to address. But for many of those in the mountains I-3 would cross, no benefit to Atlanta justifies an interstate in their back yard.

"A lot of us who live up here are just appalled anybody would think about using the mountains to solve Atlanta's traffic problems," said John Clarke, a carpenter in Hayesville, N.C., who chairs the Clay/Cherokee County chapter of the Stop I-3 Coalition.

Supporters of the project have suggested alternate routes through the mountains, but there are only a few places where an interstate could be built without great cost, and opposition in North Georgia and North Carolina is spreading rapidly under the coalition's banner.

In the speed with which it has used the Internet to organize opponents over a large area, the Stop I-3 Coalition bears more than a passing resemblance to the movement which arose against the proposed Northern Arc — a metro Atlanta beltline highway that would have connected Cartersville to Lawrenceville — and succeeded in bringing that project to a halt in 2004.

Perdue mum on stance

The Georgia Legislature this year appropriated $100,000 for the Interstate Highway Development Association, headed by former Rep. Max Burns' staffer Allen Muldrew, to promote the proposal. But Gov. Sonny Perdue said last week he isn't taking sides until the study has been done.

The Habersham, Rabun and White County commissions have passed resolutions opposing I-3, and at a public meeting earlier this month, Norwood, Stone's boss, appeared to be shifting on the issue, saying he would follow the wishes of the majority in his district.

Former Georgia Sen. Zell Miller, one of the original co-sponsors of the proposal along with Burns, said last week it was his understanding that the interstate proposal was advanced largely as a means to get a much more limited interstate between Savannah and Augusta.

"I will be long dead and gone before I-3 ever gets to Toccoa, if it even does," Miller said, referring to a North Georgia town on the proposed route.

Stone said last week the feasibility study might determine that I-3 doesn't need to go all the way to Knoxville. Other ideas include having it connect with I-85 near Lake Hartwell. The plan to run I-14 slightly south of Macon and Columbus also could be changed to put the road slightly north of those cities, he said.

"From the get-go, we've said it's going to be fairly easy to run I-14 where it's going, and it's not going to be hard to run I-3 from Savannah up through Augusta. The really hard part is what to do with it up in the mountains," Stone said.

Burns, a Republican who lost his west Georgia congressional seat last year to Democrat John Barrow, said the original idea for the two interstates sprang from a study of Black Belt poverty commissioned by Miller and conducted by the University of Georgia's Carl Vinson Institute. I-14 would follow a path across the Black Belt through Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi.

No opposition to I-14

No organized opposition to the proposed I-14 has emerged so far, although some environmentalists have raised questions about the route through one of Georgia's three surviving bear habitats in the Ocmulgee River area.

Besides alleviating Atlanta's traffic, Burns maintains the interstates would bring economic benefits to rural areas that have lagged behind Atlanta and other thriving Southern cities. Some businesses that would benefit from more trucking routes, including Atlanta-based Home Depot and Knoxville-based Goody's Family Clothing, have endorsed the interstate proposal.

"You come back to the fundamental fact that most of the development takes place along the interstate corridors," said Burns, who now works in Washington for Thelen, Reid & Priest, a national law firm specializing in government infrastructure contracts and construction projects.

Barrow has endorsed his former opponent's proposal, but Burns, who is planning another bid for Congress, has remained close to the effort, monitoring its progress through his Republican colleague, Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, who sits on the House Transportation Committee.

Burns says it's "very premature" for local governments to be passing resolutions before a study is done to judge the project's merits. But opponents already have a busy schedule of public meetings planned in Georgia and North Carolina, and another road battle seems well under way.

2005 Multi Club Event Canceled!

The Multi-Club Event for 2005 has been cancelled due to extremely low turnout. All registrants have already been notified of the cancellation and their checks have been returned. The purpose of this email is to inform other interested parties of the cancellation and ask them to spread the word to club members who may have been considering attending the event without registering in advance.

The decision to cancel was a difficult one considering the history of the event and the amount of effort that had been expended in the planning of the event by both NBATC and many other parties, but also a very easy and quite obvious one considering the low turnout. The expectation of people to come to the event and meet, hike, camp and socialize with people from the other clubs could just not have been met due the low turnout.

The general feedback that we have received from several clubs is that with the Regional Partnership Meetings and The Biennial Meeting in the same year there was just too little need and time for yet another meeting. David A. Helms

Mount LeConte Lodge

• Smokey Mountain News •Scott McLeod

The Info:

• LeConte Lodge has a capacity of 50 guests per night housed in either rough-hewn cabins or group sleeping lodges. The cabins are furnished with upper and lower double bunk beds, making them ideal for two couples or a family of four to five persons. The lodges sleep from 10 to 13 persons each.

• There are five trails to the lodge, the shortest and steepest being Alum Cave Trail at 5 1/2 miles, which a hiker in good condition can do in approximately four hours. None of these trails can be considered a stroll and you occasionally encounter ice and snow as late as May or as early as October. The other trails are Rainbow Falls and Trillium Gap, each 6.5 miles, a hike of about five hours; Bullhead at 7.2 miles and about five hours; and Boulevard, 8 miles and about 5 1/2 hours. Parking is available at the start of each trail.

• For more information go to www.lecontelodge.com .

The buzz of thousands of bees greeted us atop Mt. LeConte.

As one of the crew that operates the rustic lodge deep in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park showed us our cabin, we heard their serenade. My children were looking around, at first disquieted by the steady, loud humming sound coming from the wildflowers growing on two sides of our cabin.

“That’s the bees,” said J.C. Hines, smiling at our expressions. “You’ll get used to it.”

And we did. It was just one more of the unique experiences from a memorable night at the only place one can get a soft bed and home-cooked meals within the confines of the national park. LeConte Lodge — really a collection of a dozen or so cabins of varying size — is located right on top of 6,593-foot Mt. LeConte (the third highest peak in the Smokies after Clingmans Dome and Mt. Guyot).

Getting there

Booking a room at Mt. LeConte is no easy task.

Sometimes you just have to get lucky. Soon after learning that a new law would prevent North Carolina students from starting school before Aug. 25, I called to see if some early August weekdays were available. As the school year had begun starting earlier and earlier in August, I figured there might be a lull during this time. A couple of mid-week dates were open, so I booked a cabin for my family.

The lodge is run by a private company — Stokely Hospitality Enterprises — but is under the jurisdiction of the National Park Service. When reservations for 2006 open on the first Monday in October at 8:30 a.m., weekends and holidays will be gone within a couple of hours. By Nov. 1, every day the lodge is open — from mid-March to late November — will be reserved.

“Last year we had 12,000 overnight guests,” said Chris Virden, 37, who has been co-managing the lodge with his wife Allison for three years.

Ten years ago my wife and I had hiked to LeConte and talked with the people who were working at the facility’s lodge. In those days, people with reservations were given priority to book on the same day the following year. Virden said that system has been eliminated, which makes the first-Monday-in-October rush that much more important for those who want to stay at the lodge.

“We’ll take requests for reservations by mail. At 8:30 a.m. we start processing the mail requests at the same time we are taking phone orders,” said Virden. That means a letter seeking reservations on a particular date — or even giving the reservation-makers several options — would increase one’s chances of getting in.

A diamond in the rough

With 12,000 overnight guests per year, LeConte Lodge could hardly be called a secret. Still, because of its reputation as a place where it’s all-but-impossible to get a reservation, it seems few people have actually stayed there. Start asking around and everyone has heard of LeConte Lodge but it’s difficult to find people who have spent the night.

Part of LeConte’s appeal is its inaccessibility. The shortest route up is on the Alum Cave Trail, which is 5.2 miles with a 3,000-foot elevation gain. The trail starts in an old-growth forest and begins ascending almost immediately. At one point stone stairs cut into a huge boulder guide hikers through Arch Rock. The National Park Service has installed cables along the trail to help hikers, and they are extremely helpful in rain and snow.

Much of the trail is along loose rock, and at some points there are precipitous cliffs and the trail is only a few feet wide. The magnitude of the drop-offs will surprise those used to hiking in the Smokies, where the mountains usually rise and fall at a slope.

We made it up to the lodge in 3 1/2 hours, while our trip down at a pretty quick pace took 2 hours and 20 minutes. There are other trails (see info box) to the lodge, but all of them will require an even longer hike. Since the lodge does need supplies of food and other goods, hikers on the Trillium Gap Trail might run into the llama supply train. Three days a week supplies are brought up by the animals, which replaced horses because they did less damage to the trails.

Both getting to LeConte and off can be challenging. Hines, a member of the crew, said the story of “Little Debbie” has been retold many times this year. She was an “extremely large” woman, Hines said, who took 24 hours to hike to the lodge earlier this summer. She was physically unable to get down, so she ended up staying a week while staff tried to figure out a way to help her get off the mountain. Finally a horse was brought up, but it couldn’t handle her weight and manage the steep trail. Eventually a helicopter was called in.

“A few days later she sent the LeConte crew a box of Little Debbie cakes, Hines said, hence the name for the story.

Bre Golden and Mike Baker of Waretown, N.J., were at LeConte the same night we stayed. Mike had originally planned to ask Bre to marry him at the lodge, but had popped the question a few days earlier.

“I was scared I might lose the ring on the way up,” he said.

“This is just cool,” said Golden. “We hike a lot, but there is no elevation change in New Jersey.”

There’s no electricity at LeConte, but you hardly notice. Upon arrival a crew member will escort you to your cabin, which comes complete with a water bucket and a wash basin. Our cabin slept five, and it had amazingly comfortable, firm beds (sheets are clean and each bed has three blankets), a table with an oil lamp, and a heater powered by the lodge’s only real modern amenity — propane.

Coffee and hot chocolate are available all afternoon. The 6 p.m. dinner is family style with shared tables. The food is plentiful and hearty. We had beef, cooked apples, green beans, mashed potatoes, peaches, corn bread and soup. Wine is available with dinner but must be purchased when reservations are made.

It was overcast and rainy while we were at LeConte, but we still hiked up after dinner to where — on a clear night — many say some of the best sunsets in the Smokies can be viewed. The Clifftops are just a couple of hundred yards up a steep trail, and the rock formations are stunning. The foliage is similar to that on other heath balds in the southern Appalachians, but the area is suffering from the effects of invasive insects and acid rain like other parts of the Smokies.

Just like on the trail up to LeConte, the steepness and the ruggedness of this terrain is surprising. This area has a collection of the highest mountains east of the Rockies, and they provide a constantly stunning backdrop.

With the weather preventing us from viewing one of the famous sunsets, we contented ourselves with watching clouds roll up the mountains and engulf us, then roll away and briefly open up a portion of the mountains. Back at our cabin I let our kids do some carving with their pocket knives.

The office-lodge is the social center of LeConte. It has books, games, a load of historical photos and several tables. After the hike and some carving, we played cards and chatted with other guests before retiring early to our room

Don’t worry about missing breakfast. Crew members go around knocking on doors at 7:45 to make sure all are up for the 8 a.m. meal. And you don’t want to miss it. Pancakes, eggs, bacon, rolls, grits, plenty of coffee and hot chocolate — and all you want of all of it.

After sleeping to the sounds of steady rain, we didn’t get up early enough to take the mile hike to Myrtle Point for the sunrise. We were socked in by fog, so I got coffee and just wandered around the cabins. The silence of the morning was intoxicating.

After breakfast, we decided to head down the mountain early. We put on our rain gear and loaded our daypacks. I went by to talk to Virden about making a reservation for next year, which is when I learned that the lottery starts Oct. 3. As he sold a few T-shirts to other campers, I was thinking about getting back to civilization, back to work, back to where the buzzing of bees is seldom noticed. I asked him how he liked living atop LeConte for nearly nine months a year, and his answer was about what I expected.

“God, I love it up here. I can’t make it on the outside, there’s too much traffic.”

Other Miscellaneous Information

Southern Environmental Law Comments on North Shore

NC AT License Tag Committee Meeting Minutes

April RPC Committee Meeting Minutes

SORO ATC Ten Year Goals

RPC Spring Summary

2005 Spring RPC Mtg Attendees

RPC Member Information

ATC Comments on North Shore EIS

SMHC-ATC-ATPO 07/02/05 Meeting

ATC Position Statement on Interstate 3

GATC Position Statement on Interstate 3