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Yosemite National Park is expanding:
Yosemite National Park in California is to gain a 400-acre addition, its largest expansion in nearly 70 years. Ackerson Meadow features wetlands and rolling hills that are home to endangered wildlife, park officials quoted by AP news agency said. The land, on Yosemite's western boundary, was bought for the park by conservation group the Trust for Public Land for $2.3m (£1.7m).
Yosemite National Park covers about 1,200 sq miles of mountainous scenery. It attracts millions of visitors every year and celebrated its 125th anniversary in 2015. The new addition, which was traditionally used for logging and grazing cattle, will be preserved as habitat for wildlife including the endangered great grey owl, the largest owl in North America, the officials said.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 09 2016, @01:16PM
I am shocked. I thought it was a big park - 1200 sq miles is tiny isn't it? The lake district in UK is a similar size, but UK is a much, much smaller country...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 09 2016, @03:22PM
Here's what Wikipedia gives:
Lake District: 2,362 km² or 912 mi²
Yosemite: 3,027 km² or 1,169 mi²
I'm surprised as well after looking at the park on Google Maps. Maybe we were thinking Yellowstone at 8,983 km²/3,468 mi².
In comparison, California is 423,970 km²/163,696 mi² while Great Britain (the big island) is 209,331 km²/80,823 mi².
(Score: 2, Interesting) by gumby on Friday September 09 2016, @03:53PM
Indeed, but Yosemite is a park. As in: it has signs, roads, drinking fountains, rangers, picnic tables, etc. Since it's a big park it also has hotels, a fire brigade, and some shops. Really you can think of it as a very very large municipal park (my town, Palo Alto, has a couple of "wild" parks with mountain lions as well as hyper-manicured downtown parks).
But the national parks are a very small part of the public lands. Most of it is true wilderness lands: limited or even no trails, largely unpatrolled, with wild animals who aren't used to seeing humans (in Yosemite the bears are quite accustomed to humans and are a problem). I backpack and sleep out about 45-60 nights a year in California and rarely see another human when I'm out. I have hardly set foot in a national or state park because they (for good reasons) don't allow dogs except on roads and paved areas, which I avoid. Despite avoiding parks there are tons of places for me to have fun.
(Score: 2) by Phoenix666 on Friday September 09 2016, @08:12PM
That's a good point, and i would add we found the national forests and national monuments to be a much better experience than the shrink-wrapped experience of the national parks like Yosemite. Of course, a couple of the national parks like Death Valley and Capitol Reef aren't so built up and far more impressive than the marquee parks like Yellowstone. Canyonlands National Park is three times more impressive than the Grand Canyon.
But it's liberating to visit places like the Bighorn National Forest in Wyoming, or Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument in Utah, and not have to fight for camping spots or put up with a thousand rules. You can just go commune with the land. Want to ride your ATV all over the Oregon Dunes? No problem. Want to walk up to and sit inside an ancient Anasazi house in Canyon of the Ancients? Go ahead, it's awesome.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 1) by gumby on Saturday September 10 2016, @12:05AM
> Washington DC delenda est.
BTW I disagree with your comment -- in fact they protect your right to hang out in those wildernesses instead of having them mined or whatever. Yes, the parks are curated, but some people like that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday September 09 2016, @06:32PM
It doesn't even make the top ten in size for American national parks.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday September 10 2016, @01:24AM
The Papahānaumokuākea Marine National Monument (which is underwater) is 7.2 times the area of Great Britain.