Canyons No Longer within Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument
March 24, 2017
The following canyons will no longer be located within the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument.
This is speculation from the recently leaked draft of the modifications.
- All Egypts
- Peek-a-Boo, Spooky, Dry Fork
- Brimstone, Little, Sandslide, BFS, SOS, Scorpion
- Catstair
- Possibly Lick Wash, Deer Creek, Bull Valley Gorge, Willis Creek Narrows, Round Valley Draw
All of these canyons are still in Wilderness Study Areas. WSAs require an act of congress to revoke the designation and no new construction or mechanized vehicles are allowed.
For a more thorough look at what is in and out of the monument, see this excellent article in The Salt Lake Tribune.
I lined up the leaked draft image map with the current (former?) border and added all the Escalante canyons from the Super Amazing Canyoneering Map.
- --- Thin Black Line - Original border (same with the sharp red line)
- --- Green Diagonal Lines - Escalante Canyons National Monument
- --- Red Diagonal Lines - Kaiparowits National Monument
- --- Blue Diagonal Lines - Grand Staircase National Monument
- --- BLM Wilderness Study
- --- Bureau of Land Management
- --- National Park Service
- --- Green Pushpins - Many of the known slot canyons in the area
In the image below, it looks like the southern border of Escalante Canyons National Monument is Egypt Road so all of the Egypt canyons and anything over there that drains into 25 Mile Wash is no longer part of any national monument.
Note that Fence Canyon and all canyons on the opposite side of the Escalante River are in Glen Canyon National Recreation Area and were never part of GSENM.
All the canyons south of Egypt road on Hole-in-the-Rock Road are no longer within a national monument. This includes Spooky and Peek-a-Boo and many other canyons that drain into Coyote Gulch.
I also find it unusual that nearly all of Hole-in-the-Rock Road was removed from the monument.
I’m not quite sure about which of these slot canyons are within a national monument still. Catstair Canyon that is north of Buckskin Gulch and The Wave is definitely out now.
Download Google Earth KMZ file (16MB) where I got these images from.