This year marks the 100th anniversary of the establishment of Chaco Canyon National Monument, yet new environmental threats cloud the future of the archaeological treasure.
The New Mexico Wilderness Alliance has studied the viability of the park in light of these new environmental challenges and has made recommendations to ensure its future.
In addition to severe under funding and neglect by the federal government, development schemes threaten the health of the park, according to the alliance.
Considering that Chaco Canyon was once the center of Puebloan culture and contains magnificent architecture, it is an archaeological site well worth treasuring and preserving. Its natural beauty is a further enhancement to its historical significance.
One of the problems facing the park is possible oil and gas development on state lands adjacent to Chaco. Even the seismic testing for oil and gas reserves creates a threat to the thousand of fragile ruins in and around the park's boundaries, according to the Wilderness Alliance survey.
Currently, an oil company called Cimarex holds leases on state lands, close enough to be seen from the visitors'center if developed. Although Stare Land Commissioner Patrick Lyons said in 2006 that he does not want the lands developed, seismic or drilling activity would require the construction of roads.
The lack of roads on the periphery of the park has protected Chaco Canyon and its remote nature for 100 years. New roads would make more of the currently inaccessible areas of the park open to the public, including artifact thieves.
There is also some pressure on public officials to pave county road 7950, the primary access to Chaco from Highway 550. Although this would increase the number of visitors to the park, it would also change the nature of the visiting public.
Paving the road would likely lead to tour buses, which would mean large groups of visitors in small areas and the park is ill equipped to handle such an influx.
The study revealed that the park's infrastructure is overwhelmed even at the current level of tourists. It cites the water and sewage system, protective resources, restrooms, parking space and the visitor center as being stretched to capacity.
In the campground area alone, the septic system has failed and waste has to be pumped and hauled by truck to the current sewage treatment plant. This has resulted in the capacity for overnight camping being reduced by 50 percent.
Another looming threat to Chaco is the proposed Desert Rock Power Plant, which would be located less than 40 miles from the canyon and would further degrade air quality and visibility by as much as 55 percent on bad air days, according to the National Park Service.
Another rather weird problem lies with an early, serious surveying error in the Pueblo Pintado Outlier area. Originally set up as a separate unit of the park, Pueblo Pintado was determined in a 1993 survey to encompass important ruins which were actually located outside the park's boundaries, lying between Tribal Trust lands and Bureau of Land Management lands.
In addition to proposing opposition to oil and gas development on adjacent state lands, the paving of the access road and the construction of the Desert Rock Power Plant, the New Mexico Wilderness Alliance hopes that the relevant government agencies will come together to discuss the various problems facing Chaco.
Because 20,000 acres of land inside the park qualify as wilderness, the group hopes to obtain full wilderness protection for these wild and culturally significant lands. This would prevent any large-scale development like cell phone towers, power line corridors or large-scale infrastructure.
The alliance is hoping to enlist Congressman Tom Udall in its efforts.
