Give peak the ultimate protection
TWO VIEWS • Plan to protect more of Mount Hood stirs up admirers, users
May 28, 2004
By ALBERT KAUFMAN AND TOM KLOSTER
Mount Hood has been logged, gouged and scraped. Yet after a half-century of overuse, its 11,240-foot peak still beckons the thousands who climb it each year and the millions who drive, camp and hike along its flanks.
Oregon’s hardworking iconic mountain could use some TLC. It’s time to push for national park protection. Even with all the state’s beauty, Oregon boasts just one national park, Crater Lake. With an incredible lack of foresight, Congress has approved no sizable additions to the state’s designated wilderness areas in two decades.
A welcome proposal from U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., would nearly double Mount Hood’s protected wilderness. But much of the Mount Hood region remains open to logging, mining and commercial development. A national park designation provides significant environmental and historic protection, reserved for unique natural places.
The mountain, rising full force from a low point in the Cascades, dominates our horizon. In the 1890s, climbers and skiers began discovering the mountain with the construction of Cloud Cap Inn. In the early 1900s, the Mount Hood Loop Highway finally opened the entire mountain to tourism; the south side blossomed as a major winter sports area.
From 1905 to 1940, Mount Hood was considered for national park status several times, which would have prevented decades of logging. Even now, many visitors think Mount Hood and the Columbia Gorge are already a national park because of the parklike scenic highway, lodges and monuments at Crown Point, Multnomah Falls and Timberline.
Most of the mountain is publicly owned and under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Forest Service. After World War II, the Forest Service increasingly managed Mount Hood for its commodities: Logging, grazing and mining became the driving forces.
By the 1990s, these practices declined amid criticism about their sustainability and the scars of overdevelopment. In that decade, recreational use of the mountain has only increased.
National park status would benefit Oregonians in many ways. First, commercial logging on the mountain would end, allowing the area to recover from nearly a century of overcutting. Hundreds of new jobs would be created:Workers would be needed to plant trees, build trails, decommission logging roads and create the infrastructure for the new national park.
National Park Service staff would serve new visitors attracted to the area. New campgrounds and lodging would be built, and towns along the loop highway such as Troutdale, Sandy, Cascade Locks, Rhododendron, Dufur, Zigzag, Hood River, Parkdale and Welches would benefit.
Sure, a multitude of questions arises with such a big change. How would ski areas within park boundaries be managed? Would there be park entry fees? What would the boundaries of the new park be?
You’d expect the U.S. Forest Service and our elected officials to place a strong emphasis on protecting the mountain from overdevelopment. Yet the mountain is under assault from highway widening, logging of the few remaining stands of big trees and proposals to greatly expand the Cooper Spur resort on its northeast flank. Meanwhile, the number of trails, picnic areas, scenic drives and campgrounds has declined, despite increasing use by our growing metropolitan population.
It doesn’t have to be this way. Sen. Wyden’s plan to expand the wilderness area in the Mount Hood National Forest is great. But it would still leave important parts of the region unprotected.
Why not designate all of Mount Hood and adjoining portions of the Columbia Gorge a national park? That would unleash the full scope of scenic and historic protections needed to ensure that the mountain remains for future generations to enjoy. As the first step, our congressional delegation should ask the National Park Service for a feasibility study.
Oregonians owe it to our children and grandchildren to pass down this legacy.
Albert Kaufman and Tom Kloster are Portland residents and organizers of the Mount Hood National Park Campaign (www.mounthoodnationalpark.org).