Notice of Availability of the Draft Environmental Impact Statement for the Proposed Over The RiverTM, 41517-41518 [2010-17245]

Agencies

• DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR
• Bureau of Land Management
• Land Management Bureau

[Federal Register Volume 75, Number 136 (Friday, July 16, 2010)]
[Notices]
[Pages 41517-41518]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Printing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2010-17245]


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DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR

Bureau of Land Management

[LLCOF02000 L71220000.EA0000 LVTFC09C6050]


Notice of Availability of the Draft Environmental Impact 
Statement for the Proposed Over The RiverTM Art Project, 
Colorado

AGENCY: Bureau of Land Management, Interior.

ACTION: Notice of Availability.

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SUMMARY: In accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act of 
1969 (NEPA), as amended, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) has 
prepared a Draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the Proposed 
Over The RiverTM Art Project (Over The RiverTM 
Draft EIS) and by this notice is announcing the opening of the comment 
period.

DATES: To ensure comments will be considered, the BLM must receive 
written comments on the Over The RiverTM Draft EIS on or 
before August 30, 2010. The BLM will announce future meetings or 
hearings and any other public involvement activities at least 15 days 
in advance through public notices, media releases, and/or mailings.

ADDRESSES: You may submit comments related to the Over The 
RiverTM Draft EIS by any of the following methods:
     Web site: https://www.blm.gov/co/st/en/fo/rgfo/planning/otr.html.
     E-mail: co_otr_comments@blm.gov.
     Fax: (719) 269-8599.
     Mail: BLM Royal Gorge Field Office, Over the River 
Comments, 3028 E. Main St., Ca[ntilde]on City, Colorado 81212.
    Please write ``OTR Comments'' in the subject line of comments that 
are e-mailed or faxed. Copies of the Over The RiverTM Draft 
EIS are available in the BLM Royal Gorge Field Office at the above 
address, and on the project Web site listed above. A review copy of the 
Over The RiverTM Draft EIS is available at the Ca[ntilde]on 
City Public Library, 516 Macon Ave., Ca[ntilde]on City, Colorado; 
Salida Regional Library, 405 ``E'' Street, Salida, Colorado; Arkansas 
Headwaters Recreation Area (AHRA) office, 307 West Sackett Ave., 
Salida, Colorado; and the Denver Public Library, 10 W. Fourteenth Ave. 
Parkway, Denver, Colorado.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: For further information contact Mr. 
Vincent Hooper, Over The RiverTM Project Manager, at the 
Royal Gorge Field Office (see ADDRESSES above); telephone (719) 269-
8555; or e-mail: co_otr_comments@blm.gov.

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The OTR Corporation (OTR Corp.), formed by 
the artists Christo and Jeanne-Claude, proposes to install a work of 
art, known as Over The RiverTM, on Federal, State, and 
private lands adjacent to the Arkansas River between the cities of 
Salida and Ca[ntilde]on City in Colorado. It has filed with the BLM an 
application for a land use authorization under Section 302 of the 
Federal Land Policy and Management Act, 43 U.S.C. 1732, and its 
implementing regulations, 43 CFR Part 2920. Following an estimated 2-
year construction period, the exhibit is proposed for a 2-week display 
and viewing period in early August 2013. The proposed art exhibit is a 
no-fee visitor event. At the end of the 2-week exhibition period, the 
system of cables and anchors and other above-ground materials would be 
removed over an estimated 3-month period. The artists would be 
responsible for restoring the river corridor according to the standards 
defined by permitting and approval authorities.
    The proposed art exhibit involves the installation of 925 porous, 
semi-transparent fabric panels, weighing an average of 140 lbs/panel. 
These panels would be suspended 8 to 25 feet above the water for a 
total of 5.9 miles in eight locations dispersed along a 42-mile stretch 
of the Arkansas River. A support structure of an estimated 9,100 steel 
anchors would be drilled along and into the banks of the Arkansas River 
to support 2,275 steel anchor transition frames for an estimated 1,275 
steel cables that would support the fabric panels. OTR Corp. also 
proposes to construct two equipment laydown areas totaling 
approximately 56 acres (acreage includes visitor facilities) and a 
4,000-square-foot warehouse/office building. Upon project completion, 
the warehouse would be donated to a public agency or deconstructed and 
removed from the site.
    The earliest that the project would be exhibited is in 2013. An 
estimated 344,000 visitors (which includes 100,000 baseline visitors to 
the area) are expected to visit the Arkansas River canyon during the 2-
week exhibition period. An additional 36,000 visitors are expected to 
view both the installation and the removal of the art. The resulting 
traffic in the area is estimated to be 118,620 cars during the overall 
exhibition period, and 12,862 cars during installation and removal. It 
is assumed there would be an average of 2.9 visitors per vehicle.
    The footprint of the proposed project would encompass approximately 
310 acres. The project would be located primarily on Federal lands 
administered by the BLM Royal Gorge Field Office, but would also be 
located on lands owned or managed by the Colorado State Land Board 
(SLB), Union Pacific Railroad, and private landowners; lands leased by 
the Colorado Division of Wildlife (CDOW); and lands owned or 
cooperatively managed by Colorado State Parks in the AHRA. The Colorado 
Department of Transportation (CDOT) and Colorado State Patrol (CSP) 
have jurisdiction for activities along U.S. Highway 50. The majority of 
the project area is within Fremont County. However, a small portion at 
the western end of the project is within Chaffee County. Approximately 
80 percent of the area in the proposed project would be located in the 
Arkansas Canyonlands Area of Critical Environmental Concern (ACEC), a 
BLM-specific designation that recognizes the need for recreation use as 
well as protection of outstandingly remarkable values.
    The BLM Royal Gorge Field Office is the lead Federal agency 
responsible for preparing the EIS and complying with the requirements 
of NEPA and other applicable laws and regulations. Multiple cooperating 
agencies and permitting authorities have participated and provided 
input in the development of the Draft EIS including the Colorado 
Department of Natural Resources (DNR)--which consists of CDOW, Colorado 
State Parks, and SLB--as well as CDOT, CSP, and Chaffee and Fremont 
counties.
    Considerations for decisions to be made through the BLM's EIS 
process include:
     Whether to authorize, and under what terms and conditions, 
the artists' request for use of public lands;
     Which combination of project elements may be authorized if 
the proposed project is determined to result in unacceptable impacts 
and the artists' proposed action is not authorized in its entirety;
     Whether some or all mitigation measures identified in the 
EIS may be adopted or if additional measures may be required;
     Whether the project and its potential effects are in 
conformance with the Resource Management Plan (RMP), including the 
Arkansas Canyonlands ACEC; and
     Whether an amendment to the Royal Gorge Resource Area RMP 
is

[[Page 41518]]

necessary to allow for the use of public lands for the Proposed Action.
    Over The RiverTM was informally proposed by the artists 
Christo and Jeanne-Claude in 1996. Based on OTR Corp.'s verbal 
proposal, the BLM started conducting an Environmental Assessment (EA) 
and held public meetings between 1997 and 2000. The BLM initiated an 
informal scoping period through eight public meetings held in 
communities within the proposed project area from April 1997 to October 
2000. OTR Corp. re-approached the BLM about the proposed project in 
August 2005. Additional EA-level scoping occurred in January and 
February 2006. The BLM also hosted interagency meetings with CDOT, DNR, 
Fremont County, Chaffee County, and CSP on May 24, 2006, to discuss and 
understand the public comments and questions. The scoping comments led 
to a Notice Of Intent (NOI) published in the Federal Register on June 
19, 2006 (71 FR 35289), announcing the intent to prepare an EIS based 
on several factors, including a specific request from the applicants; 
the increasing complexity of the project; the level of controversy 
related to the project; and the level of involvement during the scoping 
process. The NOI was also advertised in local newspapers. The OTR Corp. 
and the BLM developed and signed a Memorandum of Understanding for EIS 
preparation in May 2007. OTR Corp. delivered a Design and Planning 
Report in 2007 that included a preliminary set of alternatives. 
However, the 2007 report did not include some of the details previously 
requested by the BLM and cooperating agencies that were necessary to 
move forward with the EIS. In April 2008, the BLM received a Detailed 
Design Proposal including additional project information with the level 
of detail necessary to move forward with the EIS. This led to the 
process of filing an upper-level-agency review of a Notice of Realty 
Action, published in the Federal Register on October 31, 2008 (73 FR 
64982).
    This Draft EIS analyzes seven separate alternatives, including the 
No Action Alternative. The action alternatives were developed to 
consider and compare configurations of public lands that could be made 
available for artistic panel placement as well as construction, 
logistics, traffic planning, and visitor management. The process of 
developing a range of alternatives began with a review of the artists' 
proposal and public and agency scoping comments, as well as a series of 
cooperating agency meetings. The following four project components, 
each of which could be altered in various ways to respond to known 
issues and concerns, formed the basis of the alternatives development 
process: panel placement, transportation, visitor management, and 
temporal considerations.
    The primary issues that were identified as key general concerns of 
the public, project team staff, and cooperators that are further 
analyzed in this Draft EIS include: emergency response; project 
engineering; natural and cultural resources (including soils, geology, 
noxious weeds, and wildland fire); pollution and sanitation; public 
safety; recreation; socioeconomics; transportation; and wildlife.
    Before including your address, phone number, e-mail address, or 
other personal identifying information in your comment, you should be 
aware that your entire comment--including your personal identifying 
information--may be made publicly available at any time. While you can 
ask us in your comment to withhold your personal identifying 
information from public review, we cannot guarantee that we will be 
able to do so.

    Authority: 40 CFR 1506.6, 40 CFR 1506.10.

John Mehlhoff,
Associate State Director.
[FR Doc. 2010-17245 Filed 7-15-10; 8:45 am]
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