Utah environmentalists sue feds over plan to pave canyon with Native art

Environmental groups sued the Bureau of Land Management over plans to realign and pave a road through Utah’s Gate Canyon, likening the project to "constructing a highway through the Louvre Museum."(CN) — A coalition of environmental groups in Utah filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration on Tuesday over plans to build a highway through a canyon that has cultural and historic significance to Utah and Native American history.The environmentalists challenge the Bureau of Land Management’s plans to let Duchesne County blow up and destroy cliff walls and rock formations to accommodate the construction of a highway through what the environmentalists describe as a scenic and winding gravel road through Gate Canyon in eastern Utah.The bureau plans to realign and pave about 5 miles of the road to help improve a transportation corridor for energy resources.But the environmentalists say this project will damage Native American rock art, pioneer history and habitat for threatened wildlife in the canyon. They claim the Trump administration violated federal environmental laws by approving the project without sufficiently addressing its impacts and by not following the proper procedures.“In the words of Joni Mitchell, the BLM has approved the ‘paving of paradise,’” Nine Mile Canyon Coalition leader J. Michael Hansen said in a press release. “But instead of putting in a parking lot, the BLM has given its OK to the building of a highway to carry crude oil from the Uinta Basin to Carbon County. It’s like constructing a highway through the Louvre Museum."Gate Canyon, located in Utah’s West Tavaputs Plateau, feeds into Nine Mile Canyon, which is a major archaeological area, often referred to as the world’s longest art gallery, that contains more than 10,000 historical and cultural resources.The proposed highway would fundamentally alter the character of the canyon, according to the environmentalists.The region contains a significant and high density of cultural, historical and archaeological sites joined together, previous studies from the BLM have found. The feds also previously found 47 historic sites located along or near the existing Gate Canyon Road, the plaintiffs note in their lawsuit.The project was proposed by Duchesne County and approved by the feds in April to provide an alternate route for vehicles traveling to and from oil facilities in neighboring Carbon County.Similar road realignments had been proposed in 2015 and 2022 but received significant public pushback, the environmental groups say.This latest iteration of the project was rushed in an effort to hide it from the public and rejected requests by the public to participate in the process, the environmentalists say. They accuse the BLM of quietly posting the proposed project without issuing a public notice or opening a formal comment period.If allowed to continue, they say the project would accommodate 70-foot oil tankers and could see up to 1,000 vehicles pass through each day, with about half of that traffic from heavy trucks.“The BLM knew that prior versions of this same proposal were extremely controversial and faced fierce public headwinds,” Landon Newell, an attorney with the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, said in the release. “This time around, instead of facing the public, they hid their decision and rushed their analysis and approval, all under the guise of Trump’s ‘Energy Dominance’ agenda.”Additionally, the plaintiffs accuse the bureau of making a decision that was not in accordance with land use plans, failing to analyze and disclose potential impacts of road construction and increased traffic, and failing to comply with the necessary cultural and archaeological preservation obligations, among other things.The Nine Mile Canyon region is also home to a variety of wildlife, including mule deer, black bear, mountain lion, Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep, wild turkey and golden eagle, among others. The region is also home to the Mexican spotted owl, which is listed as a threatened species on the Endangered Species Act.The environmentalists claim the feds did not analyze the impacts to the threatened owl at all.“This lawsuit challenges the Trump administration’s disgraceful plan to transform a quiet backcountry road into a highway clogged with speeding oil tanker trucks,” said Deeda Seed, a campaigner at the Center for Biological Diversity in Utah. “Blasting through Gate Canyon’s walls will be a disaster for nearby animals, including threatened Mexican spotted owls. We’re going to court to protect this irreplaceable cultural treasure and the animals calling it home.”A spokesperson for the Bureau of Land Management and Department of Justice did not respond to requests for comment.Subscribe to our free newslettersOur weekly newsletter Closing Arguments offers the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world, while the monthly Under the Lights dishes the legal dirt from Hollywood, sports, Big Tech and the arts.Additional Reads