[Federal Register Volume 64, Number 120 (Wednesday, June 23, 1999)]
[Notices]
[Page 33502]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 99-15912]
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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
National Park Service
Notice of Availability; Final Environmental Impact Statement for
the Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park Final General
Management Plan
AGENCY: National Park Service.
ACTION: Availability for 30 days of Final Environmental Impact
Statement (FEIS) for Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical
Park Final General Management Plan.
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SUMMARY: Pursuant to section 102(2)(c) of the National Environmental
Policy Act of 1969, the National Park Service announces the
availability of the Final Environmental Impact Statement for Marsh-
Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park Final General Management
Plan.
The Final Environmental Impact Statement is presented in an
abbreviated format. It must be integrated with the Marsh-Billings
National Historical Park Draft General Management Plan/Draft
Environmental Impact Statement issued in April 1998, to be considered a
complete document reflecting the full proposal and alternative, and all
significant environmental impacts. The two documents together compose
the complete Final Environmental Impact Statement.
Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park is the only
national park to focus on conservation history and the evolving nature
of land stewardship in America. Opened in June of 1998, Vermont's first
national park preserves and interprets the historic Marsh-Billings-
Rockefeller property in Woodstock. The park is named for George Perkins
Marsh, Frederick Billings, and Laurance S. Rockefeller. George Perkins
Marsh was one of the nation's first global environmental thinkers (who
grew up on the property). Frederick Billings was an early
conservationist who established a progressive dairy farm and
professionally managed forest on the former Marsh farm. Frederick
Billing's granddaughter, Mary French Rockefeller, and her husband,
conservationist Laurance S. Rockefeller came to own the property in the
1950s. They sustained Billings's mindful practices in forestry and
farming on the property over the latter half of the twentieth century.
In 1983, they established the Billings Farm & Museum to continue the
farm's working dairy and to interpret rural Vermont life and
agricultural history. The Billings Farm & Museum is operated by the
Woodstock Foundation, Inc. as a private nonprofit educational
institution.
Marsh-Billing-Rockefeller National Historical Park was created in
1992 when the Rockefellers' gave the estate's residential and forest
lands to the people of the United States. Today, the park interprets
the history of conservation with tours of the Marsh-Billings-
Rockefeller mansion and the surrounding 550-acre forest--one of the
oldest planned and continuously managed woodlands in America. Working
in partnership, the park and the museum present historic and
contemporary examples of conservation stewardship and interpret the
lives and contributions of George Perkins Marsh, Frederick Billings and
his descendants, and Mary and Laurance S. Rockefeller.
The National Park began to plan for the management of Marsh-
Billings-Rockefeller National Historical Park in 1993. Park planners
conducted a conservation stewardship workshop, a community study,
visitor and community surveys, a transportation analysis, neighborhood
meetings, and other resource inventories and assessments. In a Draft-
General Management Plan/Draft Environmental Impact Statement that
underwent 60 days of public review, the National Park Service presented
and evaluated two management scenarios (the Proposal and the
Alternative) and described five management options that were
considered, but rejected by the planning team. After considering public
and agency comment, the National Park Service adopted the draft plan's
Proposal as the final plan.
Availability
The FEIS is available for a period for thirty days, beginning on
the date of the Environmental Protection Agency publication in the
Federal Register. The National Park Service will take no action for the
thirty-day period of availability, after which time a Record of
Decision will be prepared and made available.
SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Public reading copies of the FEIS will be
available for review at Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Historical
Park, 54 Elm Street, Woodstock, Vermont. For further information,
please contact the Superintendent, Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National
Historical Park, P.O. Box 178, Woodstock, Vermont 05091; voice at (802)
457-3368; fax at (802) 457-3405.
Dated: May 25, 1999.
Terry W. Savage,
Superintendent, Boston Support Office.
[FR Doc. 99-15912 Filed 6-22-99; 8:45 am]
BILLING CODE 4310-70-M
