If you relish reading other people’s mail, Olympic National Park can put you into paradise.
The park has posted the more than 500 comments it received on its General Management Plan and Environmental Impact Statement — the policy that will guide the park for the next 10 to 15 years.
The letters and electronic messages came from individuals, plus 48 interest groups, 13 businesses, six tribes, and 16 local, state, or federal agencies.
Paper letters were scanned separately into the National Park Services’ public comment Web site. E-mails were combined into one huge spreadsheet-style file.
Individual signatures or sources were obliterated from scanned documents or omitted from electronic ones.
The draft plan was released last June for 104 days of public review and comment.
More than 725 printed copies and 150 compact discs were distributed, with other copies available at libraries and online.
More than 300 people also attended nine open houses hosted by the park.
Four strategies proposed
The 460-page document proposed four alternative strategies:
* Alternative A: Make no change in management or boundaries of the park.
* Alternative B: Protect environmental resources and expand the park at Lake Ozette, Lake Crescent and the Queets River.
* Alternative C: Provide more visitor access and expand the park at Lake Ozette and Queets River.
* Alternative D: Combine alternatives A, B and C, including all three boundary expansions.
This is the park’s “preferred alternative” that includes relocating part of U.S. Highway 101 and Kalaloch Lodge out of the coastal erosion zone and the floodplain of Kalaloch Creek.
About 1,600 of the acres the park wants are north of Lake Crescent, 12,000 are to the east of Lake Ozette, and 2,300 are in the Queets River area.
Most of the land for expansion is actively harvested for timber owned by private companies or belonging to the state Department of Natural Resources and Olympic National Forest.
To view the hundreds of comments on Olympic National Park’s plan for the next two decades:
* Visit the National Park Service Planning, Environment and Public Comment (PEPC) Web site, http://parkplanning.nps.gov/ and choose “Document List” from the Project Home for the Olympic National Park General Management Plan.
* Call 360-565-3004 to schedule an appointment at park headquarters, 600 E. Park Avenue, Port Angeles.