ness System. 



Similarly, livestock grazing and water storage are 

 other activities permitted by the Wilderness Act. At 

 present, about 200,000 animal unit months (one 

 animal unit month is equal to one cow or five sheep 

 for 1 month) of livestock grazing are taking place in 

 National Forest wildernesses. Also, there are a 

 number of small reservoirs for irrigation or stream- 

 flow regulation built before passage of the Wilderness 

 Act. 



While it is not feasible to quantify demands for 

 nonrecreational uses and activities of wilderness in 

 any meaningful way, demands for most of these uses, 

 as for recreation, seem likely to increase in the decades 

 immediately ahead. A 1977 poll by Opinion Research 

 Corporation of Princeton, N.J., indicates strong pub- 

 lic support for the National Wilderness Preservation 

 System, although interviewees were not always clear 

 about what is a wilderness. ^^ The survey, sponsored 

 by the American Forest Institute and National Forest 

 Products Association, found that only 7 percent of 

 the 2,049 individuals questioned said there is "too 

 much" wilderness. Thirty-two percent said there is 

 "too little," while 46 percent said the current amount 

 of wilderness is about right. 



Opportunities for Meeting Future 

 Demands for Wilderness 



It is probably unrealistic to consider, as some sug- 

 gest, that all currently undeveloped lands should be 

 set aside as wilderness to preserve future options. 

 There are, however, a number of opportunities for 

 increasing the size and improving the management of 

 the National Wilderness Preservation System. 



Additional units — As of July 1, 1979, Congress 

 was considering 320 Administration-endorsed pro- 

 posals covering 26. 1 million acres for inclusion in the 

 Wilderness System in the contiguous United States 

 (table 3.13). Of these proposals, 271 with a, total area 

 of 12.5 million acres were National Forest lands; 23 

 proposals, with an area of 10.2 million acres, were 

 National Park System lands; the remaining 26 pro- 

 posals involved 3.4 million acres of lands adminis- 

 tered by the Fish and Wildlife Service. 



These proposals have resulted from a series of stud- 

 ies by Federal land management agencies of their 

 roadless or undeveloped lands. For instance, the 

 Forest Service recently conducted a nationwide 



5' Opinion Research Corporation, Caravan Survey. The pubhc's 

 participation in wilderness areas. Opinion Res. Corp., Caravan 

 Surveys, Princeton, N.J. 115 p. 1977. 



''"U.S. Department of Agriculture, For. Serv. Draft environ- 

 mental statement. Roadless areas review and evaluation, Washing- 

 ton, D.C., June 1978. 112 p. 



Study, the Roadless Area Review and Evaluation 

 (RARE II). ^0 The purpose of this study was to: (1) 

 Recommend to Congress roadless areas that should 

 be designated as wilderness to help round out the 

 National Wilderness Preservation System, (2) Deter- 

 mine roadless areas that should be made immediately 

 available to nonwilderness uses, (3) Identify areas 

 that require further study. Over 2,600 roadless areas, 

 covering 62 million acres and located in 37 States and 

 Puerto Rico were evaluated by the Forest Service. An 

 evaluation procedure was used which incorporates 

 public response received on the Draft Environmental 

 Statement, the determination of National, Regional, 

 and local needs for goods and services, and pertinent 

 legislation and administrative direction. On the basis 

 of these criteria, about 9.9 million acres were 

 proposed by the President for inclusion in the 

 National Wilderness Preservation System in the 

 lower 48 States. The largest chunks of land being 

 proposed for wilderness are 2.2 million acres in Idaho 

 and 2 milHon acres in Colorado. Almost 1 million 

 acres have been proposed in California and about 

 700,000 in Wyoming. In addition, another 10.6 

 million acres will be studied for possible inclusion in 

 the system. 



In addition to the proposals before Congress, Fed- 

 eral land management agencies are continuing to 

 review the roadless or undeveloped lands for their 

 potential to be included in the National Wilderness 

 Preservation System. In particular, the Bureau of 

 Land Management has considerable land that has 

 potential for .wilderness designation. The Bureau 

 estimates that over 120 million acres of the land it 

 administers are roadless and undeveloped. Over half 

 of these lands are located in Alaska with the 

 remainder in other western States. These roadless and 

 undeveloped lands will be studied for possible inclu- 

 sion in the National Wilderness Preservation System 

 as required by the Federal Land Policy and Man- 

 agement Act of 1976. Presently, the Bureau of Land 

 Management is studying 56 million acres in the 1 1 

 western States to determine whether wilderness char- 

 acteristics exist and if they should become wilderness 

 study areas. Six million acres in the California Desert 

 Conservation Areas already have undergone inten- 

 sive study. 



Congress also is reviewing lands in Alaska for pos- 

 sible wilderness classification. Although the 94th and 

 95th Congress failed to complete the Alaska lands 

 legislation, it is expected to be taken up again in the 

 96th Congress. Proposals for wilderness in Alaska 

 vary. The Administration's recommendations to the 

 Congress in 1979 were for 50 million acres of wilder- 

 ness in Alaska of which 30.8 million acres would be in 



105 



