Months after the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) approved a road expansion proposal to expedite oil tanker truck transit through Utah’s Nine Mile Canyon, three environmentalist groups have joined forces on a lawsuit to stop the project from progressing. The filing parties claim that the Duchesne County proposal will inevitably damage various Indigenous petroglyphs, historic structures, and the habitats of threatened wildlife species.
The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA), the Nine Mile Canyon Coalition (NMCC), and the Center for Biological Diversity (CBD) jointly filed the complaint on October 6, alleging that the Trump administration deliberately obscured and sidestepped the approval process and rejected the public’s requested involvement in the decision.
The three organizations accused the BLM of failing to analyze and disclose the potential impacts of revising the existing roadway and the projected traffic increase on a cultural, environmental, and historic level. The complaint notes that the federal agency did not consult the United States Fish and Wildlife Service regarding foreseeable impacts on endangered and threatened wildlife species — including the Mexican spotted owl — and was in violation of multiple preservation and land use acts through its procedural omissions.
The BLM declined to comment on the matter, citing pending litigation.
