In 1890-1892 the Iron Range and Huron Bay Railroad built a mine hauling railroad along what is now called the Peshekee Grade/County Road 607. As recounted in an enterprising history by Robert D. Dobson, this venture was designed to link the Champion Mine with an ore dock on Huron Bay, a distance of about 40 miles.

Fifteen hundred workers laid the tracks and blasted cuts through the rocks, but the project failed miserably. Engineers had underestimated the steepness of the slopes descending to Lake Superior, and steam locomotives were unable to negotiate the climb or the descent. It became the Railroad to Nowhere.

The chief engineer fled to Mexico, the workers went unpaid, the ore dock was dismantled and the rolling stock sold. But the failed railroad eventually became the main route of a gravel road that facilitated modest development in the western part of the Michigamme Highlands: camper associations, second homes and logging.

Most of the land stayed wild and undeveloped. Parts of it became protected wilderness areas: Craig Lake State Park and the federal McCormick Tract. As late as the 1990s, it was possible to buy whole sections of land with undeveloped lakes on them - a rarity anywhere in the lower 48.

Kennecott's Eagle Mine lies about 12 miles east of the Peshekee Grade. Some area residents imagine that a new, little settlement may grow up around it, like the mining locations of the past. The mine and a new proposed North-South road, so the storyline went, would open up the back country to development: a few stores, a bar, maybe a resort or motel.

But I think this is an illusion. This alternative mine haul road, officially cancelled by Kennecott this week, would likely have barely outlasted the mine, which has a projected life of 6-8 years and no guarantees beyond that.

A better image of that haul road's likely future would be today's Peshekee Grade: created by an inflated vision of usefulness, it has become a step-child of the Road Commission, abandoned to the bruising elements of wintertime ice and snow, freeze and melt. The Kennecott Highway would have become an expensive Road to Nowhere.

This region stayed undeveloped because the land is harsh and inhospitable to inattentive humans, including engineers, investors and recreators. Snowmobilers better be thickly clothed and fully fueled when they head out across it, and even then they are running risks.

I met a man in L'Anse who was once snowmobiling along the headwaters of the Peshekee when his machine broke through the surface; he had unknowingly been sledding on top of the tag alders, on six feet of compacted snow!

At a public hearing on the North-South Highway, a Township Supervisor once remarked that the extensive McCormick wilderness should be "enough playground" for us silent-sport environmentalists. He misses the point. It's not primarily about recreation or scenic beauty, but prizing intact ecosystems, appreciating their contributions for healthy populations of native plants and animals, and not degrading them.

To protect its intact ecosystems, the U.P. cannot be a few islands of wildness. It needs bio-gems as core areas, but the linking corridors and buffer zones are really the key to long term sustainability. These are areas of mixed usage, of working forests and backwoods camp culture and recreational trails. Here we must be particularly careful when we add a road, a trail, a power line, a pit or a mine.

The small changes do add up, inexorably. Will the "next generation" of natural resource users, in particular non-ferrous mining and biomass energy projects, get it right? Don't expect Rio Tinto or even the DNR/DEQ to speak up for the best and highest uses of the land. Be part of the watchdog movement over industry and government that offers a hope that this place we call home will remain special for a long time.         
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 MARQUETTE - Objections - including those from opponents of the Kennecott Eagle Minerals Company mine - continue to be voiced over the mining company's plans to use existing county roads to truck ore from the nickel and copper project to the Humboldt Mill, west of Ishpeming.

Kennecott originally proposed moving ore from the mine on the Yellow Dog Plains east across Marquette County Road AAA to County Road 510, then south along County Road 550, through the city of Marquette to a railhead west of town.

Environmentalists and other Kennecott opponents objected to that plan and suggested a north-south route be developed. Later, when the Woodland Road and Marquette County Road 595 were proposed, concerns were raised over those north-south routes being plotted through a largely undisturbed area.

This week, Kennecott officials said that because of standing objections by federal regulators over wetlands destruction and other issues, timeline problems, costs and public concerns, the company would divert its resources from County Road 595 development to the original trucking route - with a revision.

Since its original plan was proposed, Kennecott has decided to use the Humboldt Mill as a processing center. Ore will be trucked along existing county roads as in the original plan but, in Marquette, trucks will use Wright Street to U.S. 41 and then travel west to Humboldt.

"I am shocked and disappointed to read that Kennecott is back to the poor option of using County Road 550 and Wright Street to haul their products. These roads are already horribly unsafe for recreational users (walkers and bikers)," said Michelle Carne. "In addition, this route is out-of-the-way and through residential neighborhoods. As a County Road 550 resident, I am not in support of having these loud, large trucks barrel through my yard daily. I am deeply concerned."

Jon Saari, a board member of the Upper Peninsula Environmental Coalition, said he is not "overly surprised" by Kennecott's decision, which came after the company put more than $8 million and five years into north-south route development.

"The County Road 595 corridor was the same one rejected earlier by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, as well as Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment staff people, for the so-called Woodland Road proposal," Saari said. "Kennecott and its local supporters have assumed that money and political power can overcome all obstacles, even federal laws. Well, they can't and shouldn't."

Saari said "someone at EPA has backbone."

"This decision spreads the sacrifice around," Saari said. "Now the negatives (pollution, noise, road safety) as well as benefits (jobs and taxes) of this Eagle Mine will be shared by many more county residents, not just Powell Township and Humboldt."

Cynthia Pryor, sulfide mining campaign director the Yellow Dog Watershed Preserve, said she's pleased the Marquette County Road Commission recently received the same negative response from the EPA about building County Road 595 as the Woodland Road LLC, which included Kennecott, received when its proposal was reviewed last spring.

"The law surrounding wetlands permits is clear and needs to be followed," Pryor said. "It is also important for the community to know that Kennecott does not have regulatory clearance to transport ore through Marquette, Negaunee and Ishpeming to Humboldt. Right now, their permit allows them to bring the ore to a railhead north of Marquette."

Attorney Michelle Halley, Lake Superior manager for the National Wildlife Federation, said Kennecott's original application described the county roads AAA-510-550 route in just a few paragraphs.

"Michigan's mining law (Part 632) requires that Kennecott assess impacts from transporting ore along the whole route, have a plan to repair any damage and to have contingency plans for handling accidents that could be catastrophic and deadly," Halley said. "The original application did not do that, nor has any subsequent information. Before this route is advanced, the public should know exactly what the risks and protection measures are."

Kennecott Manager of External Affairs Matt Johnson said the company is aware deviation from the originally proposed route will require a permit amendment, which would need to be sought from the DNRE.

Big Bay resident Bill Kinjorski, who owns Big Bay Outfitters and Anatomy of a Canoe, said Kennecott should have had to determine its final trucking route before they were granted a permit, with public input included.

"They're doing everything backwards," Kinjorski said. "We'd rather have had adequate research done before they decided to use County Road 550."

Kristi Mills, director of Save the Wild U.P., said "Kennecott was willing to invest $80 million in a doomed haul road (County Road 595), but refused to fund a $1.5 million hydrological study of the water-rich Yellow Dog Plains region, or to complete a fully-developed environmental impact study on the entire project (including the Humboldt Mill) and on any potential transportation route."

"Kennecott's plan is to truck tons of acid-generating rock over our quaint county roads and through our suburban neighborhoods, profoundly impacting our health, safety and tourism dependent communities," Mills said. "According to several regulatory agencies, the Woodland Road was not a viable solution to their transportation problems. It is the State of Michigan's responsibility to revoke all mining permits and terminate construction of the mine until these problems can be resolved with appropriate public input."

Halley said Kennecott's permits are the subject of a lawsuit still being litigated.

"Before the county and other public bodies spend more taxpayer dollars on the road question, they public would be better served by them insisting that the permits be judicially-validated first," Halley said. "The National Wildlife Federation (one of the litigants) does not support any transportation plan that does not meet the legal requirements and this one currently does not do so."

Jack Parker, a mining expert who has been outspoken against various aspects of Kennecott's project, said the company's decision "comes as no surprise."

"The direct route to Marquette was the closest thing they have to a permit, although the legality of even that permit is questionable," Parker said. "How about hearing from the people who live there?"

Parker said he has no confidence in any of Kennecott's plans, saying they were "slapped together in a hurry to get a mine started." He thinks the company must have better plans, but they would require a new permit application.

Parker thinks Kennecott will develop more mines using the same roads, for much longer than the roughly eight-year life estimated for the Eagle Project, which might make rail and ship transport a better bet at some point. He thinks despite the company's investment, Kennecott is not planning to use the Humboldt Mill and is likely already developing alternatives.

"My opinion is that Kennecott and others must come into the open and share their secrets so that a reasonable compromise can be reached for both short- and long-term scenarios. Let's not get drawn into more of the diversions," Parker said. "Tell them to go back to the drawing board and come up with complete and better plans - period."
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 University professors occupy an unusual niche in American society. I speak from the experience of having been one for 34 years at Northern Michigan University.

Professionals by virtue of their long and specialized graduate training, professors are considered an educated elite, and looked up to by many.

But disdainful critics see only too-smart experts and intellectuals.

Our democratic noses sniff out patronizing and smug attitudes. Yet we often enjoy demeaning caricatures of our supposed " betters" as well as our "inferiors." Along with the greedy fat capitalist and the baby-kissing conniving politician is the figure of the bumbling professor who is hopelessly out of touch with reality.

The truth is professors are interested in much more than the real world. Take the concept of profit and loss. It means the bottom line to a corporate executive, or the keys to electoral victory to a politician.

The university community fairly hums with multiple perspectives on the concept: economists theorize about externalized costs, linguists trace the changing meanings of the word "profit," historians construct portraits of economic life in different cultures and eras, and philosophers look at the logic and consistency of our use of the terms.

Stop, you say! Just give me a common sense definition. But reality has many faces in the university, and in becoming educated we learn to try them all on, like dancers putting on masks at a ball.

Such reality testing is at the heart of what professors do; we are trained not to be cogs in a machine, but critical thinkers who take very little at face value. But however much Americans praise free-thinking, many of us actually prefer like-thinking.

Conservative parents are horrified that their daughter has a Marxist professor, corporate clients want research that produces results favorable to their interests, and legislators often want to run universities like businesses.

Because of these pressures, special traditions have evolved around universities to protect them as sanctuaries for free inquiry. On principle, parents and legislators are held at arms length from the classroom, and professors (after five-to-seven years probation) are granted career-long tenure that can only be ended for serious misconduct or demonstrated incompetence.

In recent years, the mining controversy in our region has drawn NMU faculty into its vortex. At least five faculty members (three retired, including this writer) have been active opponents of the Eagle Project on the Yellow Dog Plains, while a number of others have seen it as an opportunity for professional research, even collaboration with a new multinational mining corporation.

Such diverse reactions are to be expected in an academic subculture of free thinkers and professional entrepreneurs.

But one recent collaboration between two NMU faculty members and Kennecott Eagle Mineral Company has a number of observers raising their eyebrows.

Tawni Ferrarini (Economics) and Marcelo Siles (International Studies), as independent contractors, have undertaken a study of community attitudes for Kennecott.

The first phase was completed during the summer of 2010, and utilized a SWOT analysis, which stands for an analysis of Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats related to new mining in parts of Marquette and Baraga counties. A second phase is being launched.

The main scholarly concern is that Kennecott is a client paying for this research study. It wants the information, and will ultimately use it as part of a strategy for building ties in this community.

To their credit, the researchers and their focus groups turned up perceived weaknesses and threats, even though opponents were excluded in phase one. But other problems remain.

Ferrarini and Siles emphasize that they are not representing NMU in this study, but in fact the credibility of the study rests on their degrees and university affiliation.

It would have been more transparent and convincing if it had been funded by NMU research monies instead of KEMC community outreach funds.
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 ISHPEMING - The Marquette County Road Commission unanimously approved two measures Monday to move forward development of County Road 595, an alternative to the Woodland Road.

On Oct. 7, the road commission held a public hearing on the question of whether the road project should be pursued. About two hours of public testimony was recorded, in addition to written comments submitted to the panel before and after the meeting. Almost two additional hours of public comment was heard Monday night.

The panel approved a resolution recommended by road commission Engineer-Manager James Iwanicki stating the road commission recognizes that building the new all-season primary county road is in the public's best interest.

"In making my recommendation, I took into consideration all the views expressed at the public hearing, the additional written comments, our policies, and our responsibility as the Marquette County Road Commission to provide a safe and efficient county road system within our budgetary constrains," Iwanicki said.

The road would run from the intersection of U.S. 41 and Marquette County Road FY north to County Road IAA. The exact route has not been determined, but would lie within a four-mile corridor.

The resolution further states the road commission will develop an environmental assessment and work closely with the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to minimize and mitigate impacts the new road may have to the environment.

Road commission staff will develop public and private entity agreements to minimize the design, construction and maintenance cost to the agency. Those agreements will be brought back to the road commission for approval.

The second motion adopted Monday stated road commission staff will contract with legal counsel to develop the written partnerships needed to design, build and maintain the new road. Staff time will be used to accomplish the board's directive. Funding has been earmarked in the road commission's fiscal year 2011 budget for the staff time and legal counsel required.

The road commission votes were 4-0, with Commissioner Joseph Valente absent.

"This is just the beginning of a process to look at the proposed County Road 595," said Commissioner Darryl Sundberg.

Prior to the vote, several audience members urged the panel to postpone a decision on the issue.

Some opponents, including Cynthia Pryor of Big Bay, said the new road is a thinly disguised effort by the Kennecott Eagle Minerals Company to work through a public agency to develop a haul road from Kennecott's Eagle Mine project on the Yellow Dog Plains to its Humboldt Mill processing center.

"I want Kennecott to come out from behind your skirts," Pryor told the board.

Pryor claimed the road commission public comment process was flawed. She urged the board to hold another meeting where a wider audience would have a chance to comment. She also said opponents would seek to put the road question before voters.

"We are prepared to take this to a referendum and ask for a vote," Pryor said. "This is a Kennecott project. Think long and hard about it. You need more public comment."

Kristi Mills of Save the Wild U.P. presented the road commission with more than 200 signatures on a petition asking the panel to stall its decision.

"We suggest that you table it indefinitely until proper research can be done," Mills said.

Marquette County Board Chairman Gerald Corkin said when Kennecott originally proposed using Marquette County roads 510 and 550 as its haul route, mine opponents were against that. They later opposed the Woodland Road, designed as an alternative. Now they oppose the alternative to the alternative.

"No matter what they do, you can't satisfy everybody," Corkin said.

Corkin said he believes environmental concerns, which shelved the Woodland Road after objections from federal agencies, can be addressed. He said supporting the new road for its safety in removing mining and logging trucks from other routes is common sense. He also said the road and mine will mean local employment.

"Jobs are a top priority in Marquette County and every other county in the state of Michigan," Corkin said.

Humboldt Township Supervisor Joe Derocha said his board is behind the project and the notion that Kennecott would likely be a major source of funding for building the $50 million to $80 million road.

"Economic potential for Humboldt Township is great," Derocha said. "It isn't very often that we have an opportunity for private dollars for a public road."

One opponent, who refused to give her full name, asked each of the road commissioners by name if they owned Kennecott stock. The panel did not answer.

James Sodergren of Ishpeming Township said a recent Marquette County Planning Commission study revealed that 28 percent of the county is covered by wetlands and 58 percent of county land is off the tax rolls.

"I think we can afford to cover up a couple of cattails to build a road," Sodergren said.

Joe Coluccio of Chocolay Township said he owns property in the area and the road will benefit him by providing improved access.

Coluccio said the area, while wild, is not pristine nor wilderness. He said there are many old mine pits in the area and former logging operations improved those same lands for wildlife. He said there are plenty of wild places left in the region. Coluccio said you could spend the rest of your life in Marquette County and never see it all.

Several speakers Monday talked of preserving the wildlife, wetlands and waterways values of the land in the road corridor.

Jon Saari of Marquette is another property owner in the area. He suggested additional alternatives be considered including developing the new route by using and improving the Peshekee Grade. Saari said his preferred alternative would use County Road AAA to CR510 to the "Red Road" and then the southernmost 10 miles of the formerly proposed Woodland Road.

Saari said using the northern section of the corridor is offensive to those who know it well and is likely to draw objections from regulatory agencies.

"This is a poor idea. We have better ideas. We should avoid that top part of that corridor," Saari said, suggesting voting for the proposed corridor Monday would prevent the road commission from considering alternatives outside its boundaries in the future.

Marquette County Board member Deborah Pellow said despite suggestions to the contrary, it's not unusual to have half of a road project paid for by a private entity, citing housing developments as an example.

"We would urge you to move forward on this," Pellow said.

Powell Township Supervisor Daryl Wilcox said his township supports the project. Personally, he wants the road extended to Big Bay and not end at the mine site, which is seven miles from connecting all-season roads.

Wilcox said County Road AAA is a seasonal road, not plowed by the road commission. He said no governmental agencies have been able to tell him if that road would be plowed. He said residents could live in Big Bay, 10 miles from the mine site, and not be able to easily reach it from their community to work there.

"I just want you to think a little bit more than a dead end road," Wilcox said. "Because when the mine is gone, that's exactly what it is going to be."

After the road commission vote, opponents disrupted the meeting by standing and repeatedly reciting the Pledge of Allegiance. The road commission adjourned the session.
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 I would like to say that tree huggers have made the greatest contribution to land protection in the Upper Peninsula. Certainly groups and individuals have kept up a steady drumbeat of activity, promoting visions of a U.P. with healthy watersheds, sustainable forests, and intact wild areas. But I don't think they are the main factor.

Some would say it is the sportsmen, who have helped promote sound regulation of natural resources, with a constant eye on protecting the habitat necessary for viable populations of wildlife, both game and non-game species. But I don't think they are the main factor either.

Others might argue that it is the elected officials and state and federal agencies, especially the Michigan Department of Natural Resources and Environment, which is are formally charged with protecting the landscapes and waters of the state from destruction, impairment, and pollution. But these three ills seem ever-present. No, they are not the main factor either.

I would propose more modest actors as the main factors: biting insects and long winters.

Although no match for Siberian insect swarms, our home-grown mosquitoes and black flies do quite well in intimidating the weak of heart. Oh how fearful is June, for all but the most tenacious trout fisher draped in a bug net. But how blessed are August and September.

Like their kinsmen in other northern climes, Yoopers worship the brief months of summer. Normal activities cease, offices close. It is impossible to get a quorum for a meeting. Life moves outdoors, to camp, to the woods, to the lake.

Summer is a short respite because winter sets the tone to life in the U.P. It is the silent black-and-white season that shuts down the biting insects, but brings its own horrors: snow-covered roads (and mud in the spring), weeks of depressing lake-effect snow in the northern counties, and cold that sometimes keeps even the bold-hearted indoors for days.

Most people don't like insects and long winters, and they are the key to resource protection in an era when mining has waned and recreation and tourism are in ascendency. Sheer numbers of people create stresses on all nearby natural systems.

The U.P. is fortunate, in this regard, in that its census numbers have remained steady for 100 years: from 1910 to 2010 the population has vacillated between a high of 332,556 (1920) to a low of 302,256 (1950). This has meant a population density today of about 19 persons per square mile. This low density and steady population, despite the ebb and flow over time of logging and mining, are the key facts about our region.

I have lived on the island of Taiwan off China's coast, which is slightly smaller in size than the U.P. (Taiwan is 13,892 square miles, the U.P. 16,452 square miles) The main difference is that Taiwan has 23,046,177 (2009) people and a population density of 1730 persons per square mile.

Imagine, if you can, our cities each with over a million residents, and our small towns, like Sidnaw and Amasa and Seney and Trenary, each with hundreds of thousands. The U.P. would no longer be a landscape of small cities and towns, with thousands of backwoods camps. It would no longer be 85 percent forested, nor would its waters run clean.

So I say praise to the biting insects and the long winters. We are a hearty folk who have survived these trials, as well as a chronically higher unemployment rate, who have stayed and come to love this land.

Lon L. Emerick got it right in his satirical booklet You Wouldn't Like It Here (2005) when he devoted short chapters to climate and insects. His underlying fear was that the U.P. would be overrun by new residents and migrants, drawn by all our stellar natural attractions and quality of life. But a sober consideration of geography and historical demography would seem to make his fears unnecessary.
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 Civil disobedience is commonly associated with historical struggles for basic human rights, a citizen recourse in situations where government has gone badly off course.

After Cynthia Pryor's arrest near Eagle Rock, it is not surprising that some have linked her name with Rosa Parks, a notable civil rights era personality. Both openly refused to give up a seat, one on a segregated public bus, the other on a stump on contested public land.

But there is a home-grown tradition of civil disobedience in the Upper Peninsula that is perhaps more fitting as a comparison than the epic struggles over basic human rights. That is the tradition of standing up for one's rights on the land, often in hidden resistance to authority.

Residents resent being told by the state, or any other outsider, what they can or cannot do, if their actions seem reasonable in their own eyes. Poaching game during hard times is a U.P. tradition tolerated in public opinion when tied to family and personal subsistence. My Uncle Vernon (Ironwood-Hurley) helped support his family during the Depression years by catching brook trout. Nothing went to waste, but he observed no creel limits. The illegal shooting of wolves today is another sign of a backwoods ethic that short-circuits the law.

Some hunters have taken the law into their own hands, convinced that wolves are killing "their" deer, or are a danger to children, pets or domestic animals. A conspiracy of silence seals lips, and this silence in itself is a type of resistance to state authority.

The 1980s and 1990s saw a strong push for landowner's rights, sometimes called the property rights movement. Signs appeared in the backwoods of the western U.P.: "DNR KEEP OUT." Some people resented, and resisted, DNR/DEQ restrictions on land use and resource management.

Richard Delene (Baraga) was perhaps the most notorious case. He was prosecuted and eventually banned from Michigan for contempt of court after controversial dredging and ditching on his Baraga Plains land. Many felt he did not get a fair hearing.

Customary road access on private lands has become a big current issue, as metal gates sprout up everywhere. New second home owners, often city folk from downstate or out-of-state, bring their urban values and fears with them. It's the fence-me-in fence-you-out mentality. Vandalism of gates, signs, and property is not uncommon.

When Kennecott/ Rio Tinto began putting up fences on public land with "No Trespassing" signs, a shock of finality hit many mine opponents. Cynthia Pryor's arrest for stubbornly sitting on a stump was a catalyst for a deeper emotional reaction: This is wrong. Tracts of public land should not be locked away for decades for private profit.

The recent Native American encampment on Eagle Rock lies within this Yooper tradition of civil disobedience over land rights. Treaties with the U.S. government in the nineteenth century secured them the right to hunt, gather and fish in the ceded territories.

Some of them have chosen to stand by their rights on these lands, in the face of controversial efforts by the state of Michigan and an international corporation to diminish those rights.

While Kennecott/Rio Tinto seemed prepared to negotiate some limited Native access to Eagle Rock as a religious site, the company's bottom line was to secure its own access, by armed state police if necessary, to Eagle Rock as the mine portal.

Despite the fences, the signs and the bulldozed encampment, Eagle Rock will continue to be a place of resistance, symbolic or otherwise, to this mine. From a legal perspective, the protestors may seem to be in the wrong, however peaceful their stance. But in their guts many U.P. residents will understand where Cynthia Pryor and Charlotte Loonsfoot are coming from in this unequal face-off with corporate and state power.

They are standing by their land, whether it is public land or ceded territory, come what may.
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 Seven years into a long and hard fight over the Kennecott mine on the Yellow Dog Plains, what have we learned as a community about the role of environmental advocacy? Is there value in questioning the process of starting a new mine or is such questioning mere anti-development obstructionism?

First, a vigorous public debate has led to stronger oversight. Public officials, both politicians and agency staffs, know they have been under a strong microscope of public scrutiny. Elected politicians by nature seem not to welcome adversarial debate and prefer sitting on the fence (even a picket fence).

For them, the 2004 amended law on Part 632 (non-ferrous mining) was the be-all and the end-all of debate. It created guidelines and standards for mining safely. But laws require working rules for implementation, and the meaning of words like "safely" is not self-evident.

Legal review was warranted, considering the precedent-setting nature of this first mine under the new law. Review is still under way, although without an injunction, the mine will proceed. The staffs of the public agencies, in this case the Office of Geological Survey of the Michigan Department of Natural Resources, bore the brunt of the decision-making about the mine.

Opponents challenged them in public hearings, in public testimony and in formal legal settings with expert witnesses. Opponents discovered questionable claims as well as small and large scandals. An example is the debate over the crown pillar. Is the crown pillar (which supports the Salmon Trout river above the mineral deposit) vulnerable to collapse? (It's alleged that) DNR staff suppressed the report of one of their own skeptical experts.

Terrible consequences rest on these assessments of the likelihood of collapse and environmental advocates prefer to err on the side of caution. Second, opponents have widened the angle of vision for debate. Jobs versus environment is too simple a framework for understanding this crisis.

Looking forward, how do our small Upper Peninsula communities create a new sustainable economy that will be here for our children and grandchildren? It is about the future and the kind of U.P. we want, we being Yoopers and transplants, young and old, workers and seniors.

How do the extractive industries of the past (mining and logging) fit into that future? How best help a landscape under many stresses (from fragmentation to industrial development to global warming) adapt successfully to new conditions?

The U.P. as a region should be part of innovative solutions for the big issues of our time. Third, the guiding sentiment for opponents (almost all volunteers) is love of place. This does not translate into turning the U.P. into a park or playground, as some critics claim. It does mean that the U.P. should never again be an industrial moonscape as it was around 1920 after the Great Cutover. Its public and private forests should be sustainably harvested, its special places given enhanced protection, its lakes and streams kept free of pollution.

These are broadly shared sentiments and conservationists regard themselves as a constituency and voice to advocate for these shared goals.

Lastly, we need watchdogs for industry and government. Transparency and openness supposedly rule in the public sphere, while in the private domain corporate power works in lawful secrecy.

For transparency, the press and watchdog NGOs (non-governmental organizations) have an important role to play. While the print media is suffering nationally, cutting back on investigative, scientific, and international coverage, it is especially important that watchdog groups of all kinds pick up the slack.

The U.P. is fortunate to have the presence of a few big conservation groups (National Wildlife Federation, the Nature Conservancy, Sierra Club) and many small regional and local groups.

They all try to hear the drumbeat of community values and concerns and not get swept away by the clangor of political opinions and the trumpeting of industrial lobbyists.
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| The name Woodland Road is about as misleading a characterization as Kennecott Minerals could have come up with for the haul road that would link its mine site on the Yellow Dog Plains and its proposed mill in Humboldt.

Do you imagine a meandering woods road, framed by a canopy of trees, like the old H-58 along the edge of Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, or perhaps the Peshekee Grade road that snakes back and forth along that river for over twenty miles? Think again.

This road is more like the new stretches of County Road 550 going up towards Big Bay or County Road 553 heading south to Sawyer Airport, except that it will have an alternating gravel and paved roadbed. It will cut a varying swath through the landscape, with 32 feet of road bed and a wide shoulder.

Bends and curves have been engineered out of it to make it as straight and efficient a shot as possible. The idea is not to linger but to get where you want to go as quickly as possible. Time, after all, is money.

Kennecott plans to spend millions ($50-80 million are estimates) over five years on this 22.3 mile long woodland road. They will reconstruct about three and a half miles of the existing Wolf Lake county road, but otherwise build almost 20 miles of new road where at best unimproved two-track existed previously.

This is not a road through the woods but a primary highway within a 90-foot corridor. That's why it is so expensive. But the real cost of this Kennecott highway will be borne by the wild lands on either side of this wide corridor. It will chop up and permanently scar one of the least developed areas of the Upper Peninsula.

Its proponents tout that it will provide needed access to the storied headwaters of the Yellow Dog, the Mulligan, and the Dead rivers for loggers and recreationists. Along the way 23 streams will be crossed, more than 172 separate wetland units filled in, some up to 139 feet wide. Numerous rocky knolls and canyons will be blasted apart to make way for this highway.

State permits are required for these stream and wetland crossings, and they will no doubt be well-built according to the current state of the art. But who is looking into the larger consequences of fragmenting an extensive wild area with a highway? Roads break up natural communities. They become channels for dust, noise, pollution, and invasive plants and animals. They become killing fields for wildlife of all sizes. They alter the hydrological conditions, creating drier or wetter habitats on either side of the road.

The scientific literature is replete with the often disastrous impacts of roads on natural communities, which is why relatively roadless areas are especially prized for pure water, plant and animal biodiversity, and native species.

It is no surprise that the Michigan Department of Natural Resources staff for fisheries and wildlife, when asked to comment in 2009 on the proposed haul road, wrote that the environmental impact of such a road through undeveloped wild areas (compared to using existing transportation routes) is huge and negative. This highway is only necessary for the monster trucks of Rio Tinto, which will be travelling at 50 mph on a straight graded highway through the wetlands and canyons of the backwoods.

Nobody else truly needs it, thank you, although for some it would make access more convenient. This is the kind of destructive progress that the U.P. does not need, for once our wild areas are fractured, like Humpty Dumpty there is no way to reverse the damage and put them back together again.

Kennecott Minerals talks about one day eradicating its mine site and buildings around Eagle Rock, but this Kennecott highway will be a permanent change to the wildness that defines our special U.P. homeland.
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 The recent Mining Journal editorial (October 21) on the proposed statewide ballot initiative for November 2010 was generally factual and fair-minded. It argued the importance of clean water as well as jobs, of tourism and recreation as well as mining; and it urged U.P. residents to study the issues and ask tough questions.

Only in its conclusion was the editorial mean-spirited and misleading, in claiming that the REAL issue is about a group of people who want to prohibit all mining in Michigan by any means and are using the water angle to dupe voters.

I resist being pigeonholed into some secret cabal. My interests in the issue of mining and water protection are multiple, like those of most people. I am the grandson of a Finnish immigrant miner, the nephew of a union negotiator, a professional historian, a believer in regional land protection, and a supporter of this ballot initiative.

Is it vain to hope that the statewide discussion of this ballot initiative over the next year will remain civil and issue-focused? That it will not degenerate into name-calling, emotional slogans, and charges of conspiratorial scheming by corporate or environmental elites? That we can all acknowledge and respect that U.P. residents (whether Yoopers or transplants, retirees or young workers) have differences in values and perceptions about our region's history, current state, and future prospects?

Let this be an issue-oriented debate, and let the people indeed make up their own minds and vote on this ballot initiative.

That said, I see four important questions that the ballot initiative highlights:

Is all mining the same, as the Mining Journal editorial assumes, or are there important differences among the types of mining? The ballot initiative is quite specific about amending Part 632 on Nonferrous Metallic Mineral Mining; it separates out sulfide and uranium ores because of their water-destroying potential. It does not impact the traditional mining of iron oxide ores in the Upper Peninsula.

Should there be site-specific criteria that make sulfide and uranium mining more difficult in water-rich environments? Part 632, unamended, assumes that the permitting process will take care of protecting sensitive sites. But what if the ore body is right under a river, and there are serious questions of mine stability and collapse? Or a world-class natural area of headwater streams like the Michigamme Highlands would be threatened by a new industrial mining zone? The ballot initiative raises the bar on water protection by placing a buffer zone around water bodies.

Should an independent hydrological assessment of the water resources be required in any permit application to mine sulfide and/or uranium ores? This seems like a no-brainer, and has been recommended in the past by reputable observers. It is not, however, required by Part 632.

Given that all mines pollute, should not prospective mining companies be asked to demonstrate that somewhere in North America, under similar environmental conditions, a successful minimally polluting mine has existed and been closed? This provision is similar to Wisconsin law, which resulted from a 20-year struggle to develop reasonable and protective legislation for sulfide mining.

The big question in most people's minds is whether sulfide and uranium mining can be done safely. Proponents of the ballot initiative ask us to err on the side of caution in answering this question. Too much is potentially at risk long-term with a new industrial mining zone in our valuable and irreplaceable Great Lakes watershed. We have forums - our State permitting and enforcement agencies as well as the courts - for weighing and deciding these questions, but ultimately stronger legislation and a vigilant citizenry might be our best protection.

We do not want to wake up one day to discover that our short-term employment gains have left us poorer overall. "Currently" we need these jobs, argues the Mining Journal editorial, but when the mines are gone, as they inevitably will be sooner or later, what will we be left with? Will we still enjoy the hunting and fishing, the berry picking and recreating and emotional healing that the wild lands and waters provide for us today?
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 ISHPEMING - Concerns about the planned Kennecott Eagle Project and the proposed Woodland Road that would connect the mine to a renovated Humboldt Mill were voiced at a Marquette County Road Commission public hearing Monday night.

No action was taken on the plan submitted by Woodland Road LLC, which would make improvements to a little more than 3 miles of public roadway along the 22-mile project. The next road commission meeting is scheduled for Oct. 19.

"From the road commission standpoint, this is a developer dealing with improving a county road and we're treating them just as any other developer, whether it is a guy building a house at the end of a road or a Target going in or some manufacturer going in, that's the way the road commission is dealing with the issue," said James Iwanicki, the commission's engineer-manager.

Although many in the 20-person audience spoke against the proposed mine itself and voiced concerns over the entire road project, Iwanicki said the road commission only has jurisdiction over the public road portion of the project. The project runs south from the Triple A Road in Champion Township to U.S. 41, intersecting about a mile east of the M-95 intersection.

Questions were raised over who would have the right of way, road construction and maintenance and what would happen after the road is no longer used for the mining operation.

"I think there's all kinds of concerns going forward," said Cynthia Pryor of Big Bay. "Who's going to plow it? When/if Kennecott even goes there and then they leave, who's going to continue to take that over? What's going to happen to the maintenance of this roadway? ... I think there's a lot of questions out there."

Woodland Road LLC will be financing the $50 million project, adding about $2 million worth of improvements to the public road portions.

At intersections with the public roads, Iwanicki said the private road would likely get the right of way due to the higher volume of traffic.

"I believe because of the volumes of traffic of what's going to be out there, I think the private road is going to have the right of way most of the time," he said.

The road commission would continue to provide winter plowing and other maintenance of public portions of the road. Woodland Road LLC would be responsible for all private portions of the road. Control, ownership and liability of the road would remain with the private owners, both while it is being used for industry and after.

Iwanicki said he would be recommending that no road commission money be spent on the road improvements and the new road would bring no extra money to the commission.

"We've done an extensive safety study of the road," Ken Wooley, a Kennecott employee who is chief operating officer for Woodland Road LLC, said this morning. "(The road) is primarily done to come up with a safer road that reduces exposure risks.

"The road is not tied to the mine. This is truly a multi-use road."

In addition to Kennecott, partners in the road include A. Lindberg and Sons, Michigan Forest Products Council and private landowner John Jilbert.

Wooley said that the current intention is for the road to remain open to the public for easier access to the Yellow Dog Plains area, and will also be used by other industries, such as logging. The road would also benefit mine employees, providing a more direct route to the site.

The road is also projected to save more than a million miles of mine traffic over alternative routes along county roads 550 and 510.

For some audience members, the connection between the proposed mine and road outweighed all other concerns.

"If the road is open to the public, it's going to make it easier for me to get up to the Yellow Dog Plains, but I don't know if I'm going to want to go up there any more because much of the appeal in this area is its feeling of remoteness and with this very large, wide road in there, much of that is going to get destroyed," said William Malmsten, vice president of the U.P. Environmental Coalition. "Traveling an industrial highway with a steady stream of huge mining trucks to arrive at a toxic waste zone is not my idea of a fun Sunday afternoon drive."

Others asked the commission to wait on its decision until all the permits required for the mine are secured by Kennecott.

"What's the rush?" asked Jon Saari of Marquette. "I would urge you to wait because that's something that's within your power."
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 MARQUETTE -As an author, longtime wildlife biology professor at Northern Michigan University and a vocal environmental activist, Bill Robinson touched many lives.

The Upper Peninsula Environmental Coalition, of which Robinson, 75, is a charter member, paid tribute to him Saturday night as friends and family spoke fondly of their memories of him.

Robinson was born in Ironwood and moved with his family to Marquette as a small child. UPEC president Jon Saari said Robinson's U.P. roots had a lot to do with how he looked at environmental issues.

"He respected the local traditions of hunting and fishing and also lumbering and mining and felt that our environmental activism had to be respectful of those traditions," Saari said.

Saari said Robinson believed that all of nature, both the "useful and non-useful", had to be protected. Saari read from testimony Robinson made before a congressional hearing in 1985 about the Michigan Wilderness Heritage Act.

"Forests, water, soils, some minerals, game animals are called resources. We have known uses for them. But the rest of the components of the system, such as dead trees, fungi, toads, shrews, loons, orchids, spiders ... and variant of other participants in this community of life are regarded as non-resources," Saari read.

While mining, timber and crops are important, Robinson went on to argue, they are merely parts of a bigger ecosystem that needed to be managed carefully.

John Bruggink, one of Robinson's graduate students who is now a wildlife biology professor at NMU, said Robinson had a great enthusiasm for taking students into the field.

"On fall days at Wetmore Pond he was known to exclaim things like 'There, just look at this. Try getting this at some lab at Michigan State!'" Bruggink said.

Progressive memory loss has afflicted Robinson for the past few years and he now resides at the Jacobetti Home for Veterans.
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 MARQUETTE - What is special about living and working in the Upper Peninsula to a birdwatcher, hiker, spiritual leader, park superintendent, television weatherman, historian, artist, kayaker or a filmmaker?

Find out Saturday when a dozen speakers offer their personal observations of life in the U.P. at the Upper Peninsula Environmental Coalition's "U.P. Celebration. The event will be at the "Three Corners" - Landmark Inn, Peter White Public Library and the Federated Women's Clubhouse- at the intersection of Front and Ridge streets in Marquette.

"Being a watchdog to government and industry, as UPEC activists have done for over 33 years, can be mind-numbing and burn people out. We forget to celebrate sometimes," said UPEC President Jon Saari. "This event is to put our appreciation of the beauty and tranquility of the U.P. front and center. It's the deepest reason why we want to protect this place."

The various speaker sessions will take place at the library, clubhouse and inn from 10 a.m. until 2:45 p.m.

Presenters range from Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore Superintendent Jim Northup, birdwatcher/photographer Scot Stewart and kayak instructor Sam Crowley to WLUC-TV6 meteorologist Karl Bohnak, Northern Michigan University history professor Russell Magnaghi and Hannahville Indian Community cultural director, spiritual leader and tribal council member Earl Meshigaud.

Wildlife biologist Rolf Peterson, a retired Michigan Tech University researcher, will be on hand with filmmaker George Desort for the Marquette premiere of "Fortunate Wilderness: The Wolf and Moose Study of Isle Royale."

A complete list of presenters is available at www.upenvironment.org. Programs will be available after 9 a.m. Saturday at the Landmark Inn.

"There's something here for everyone, and it's free because all these presenters are donating their time to share their excitement about the U.P. with fellow residents and visitors," Saari said.

At 3 p.m. in the Peter White Library Community Room there will be a panel discussion on "Prioritizing the U.P. Landscape." What's the highest and best use of this land? How do we balance protection with community needs? What values are at play over this landscape?

Panelists include Eric Hansen, an author, hiker and advocate; Tina Hall, director of Conservation Programs with The Nature Conservancy; Northup; Marvin Roberson, a forest ecologist with the Sierra Club; and Jan Schultz, a botanist with the U.S. Forest Service.

From 5 to 7 p.m., there will be a reception at the Federated Women's Clubhouse with drinks and refreshments. At 5:30 p.m., a special tribute to former Northern Michigan University wildlife biology professor Bill Robinson will take place, with reminiscences from colleagues and friends.

Robinson was one of the founding members of UPEC in 1976 and a nationally known research biologist and author. He is now institutionalized with severe memory problems.

Organizers expect the celebration to become an annual event.

"We selected the date because it lands in the in-between season time frame. Skiing is virtually over, the trails are too muddy for recreation, the water too cold-frozen to paddle," said Karen Bacula, event coordinator. "It was hoped that this would inspire people for the upcoming warm weather and potential for outdoor recreation."
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 LANSING - The U.S. Senate could soon debate a proposal that would put nearly 2 million acres under permanent wilderness protection, including part of Pictured Rocks National lakeshore.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., recently called for the bipartisan bill to be considered in a lame-duck Senate session starting next Monday. The bill is a compilation of more than 150 different proposals for land protection nationwide.

In Michigan, 11,740 acres in the Beaver Basin area of Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore would be given permanent wilderness protection.

The bill would prevent commercial development in the lands forever, said Jon Saari, president of the Upper Peninsula Environmental Coalition, which supports Congress taking up the measure.

Democratic Sen. Carl Levin, D-Southfield, supports the bill because it contains four of his proposals that would affect the state, including one giving the federal government authority to acquire land only from willing sellers, according to the senator's staff.

U.S. Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Lansing, is a co-sponsor of Levin's bills. Her office couldn't be reached for comment.

"It is critical that the pristine natural features of the Beaver Basin area remain the treasure they are today," Levin said in a press release issued earlier this year.

According to Levin's staff, the designation wouldn't change how the land is managed, ensuring continued public access and use. Motorboats would still be allowed to land along the Lake Superior shoreline.

President George W. Bush has said he would sign the bill, according to the New York Times.

Outside the state, the bill would include protecting land in Idaho and California.

But the executive director of the American Land Rights Association, Chuck Cushman, said the Washington-based group opposes the bill, deeming it "one of the largest land-grabs in history."

Cushman said, if passed, the bill would allow the federal government to reduce public recreational land.

"They're taking millions of acres and proposing this regime," he said.

But Saari said the remote, backcountry land would still be available for camping and boating.

"There is no strong opposition to this legislation in Alger County," where the Beaver Basin land is located, he said.
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