30 Recreation Uses on 



gamation of the two services. It would be practically necessary 

 to consolidate the Forest Service and the Park Service into one 

 administration under a single head. 



The other alternative of transferring all recreation areas to 

 the National Parks would simply abolish the National Forests. 

 For as long as any Forests are left they will continue to be used 

 for purposes of recreation; and these uses will be extensive and 

 valuable. 



While both these ideas are manifestly absurd when offered for 

 sweeping adoption, each has some merit when applied within 

 important limitations. Some degree of cooperation has naturally, 

 almost necessarily, been established between the Forest Service 

 and the Park Service, for example in the fire patrol of neighboring 

 areas. Arrangements might be made, and obviously should be 

 made, for connecting Park trails with Forest trails where the two 

 services administer adjoining lands. Mention has already been 

 made (p. 7) of the " Park-to-Park Highway" built through the 

 National Forests and connecting Yellowstone and Glacier National 

 Parks. Rather extensive timber cuttings for forest improvement 

 and fire protection are needed at the present moment in certain 

 places in the National Parks, and such operations could probably 

 be conducted most advantageously by experienced men from the 

 staff of the Forest Service. Cooperation in these and similar 

 ways is much to be encouraged; but all this falls far short of the 

 wholesale exchange of services imagined by those who would 

 offer this as a complete solution of all administrative problems. 



The second suggestion, that recreation areas be taken out of 

 the National Forests and added to the National Parks is also 

 capable of limited application. It has in fact been adopted in 

 the case of Glacier and Rocky Mountain National Parks; and the 

 move to assign the Gtand Canyon to the family of the National 

 Parks is approved by all informed persons. 



