Overflights Council assesses aircraft influence in Denali Park

The Denali Aircraft Advisory Council met last week to review information gathered during the last season of activity inside Denali National Park, and to what extent aviation had an impact on the wilderness experience of park users.

The Council was established 6 years ago to help establish voluntary best-practices to minimize noise disturbances within the park. At their most recent quarterly meeting, the council heard a number of reports from soundscape researchers, as well as representatives from user groups who had gathered information on how well the current air-traffic patterns for flight-seeing and back-country taxi services had coincided with the Park Services goals of minimal noise disturbance. According to Council co-Chair Erika Bennett, the voluntary best practices are largely effective in preserving the enjoyment of the public

1AircraftOverflight

The council provided recommendations about trying out a new flight corridor on the north side of the range which would involve aircraft flying over the park road – something that had been previously avoided.

According to Bennett, the council takes a lot of input from a wide variety of constituents, and based on park-visitor survey cards, they noted that very few people had remarked on the noise level, which in their view indicates the Overflights Council’s recommendations are working

2AircraftOverflight

The Council’s recommendations for voluntary best practices can be found on the Denali National Park’s web page, by doing a search for Overflight Advisory Council