In the context of really ludicrous ideas like oil shale freeze walls and leaching uranium out of drinking water aquifers, building a new 10,000 person city on the Continental Divide in the middle of a critical lynx habitat corridor seems merely crazy.  But even if it doesn't top the list of really bad ideas, it's still pretty darn bad.  We celebrated a nice victory last week when a U.S. District Court judge recommended the continuation of an injunction preventing the Forest Service from moving forward with plans for the new city. 

Although the lawsuit pertains specifically to two proposed roads, they are required for the developer to move forward with the project.  The billionaire developer, Red McCombs, predictably has ties to the Bush administration.  Evidence continues to surface that McCombs had an improper relationship with the environmental consultant hired to analyze the proposal for the Forest Service (including, if you can believe it, rewarding the consultants who helped the Forest Service reach the right decision with NFL game tickets).  Hats off to our colleagues with Friends of Wolf Creek for leading the fight.

The fight to protect this key lynx corridor underscores just how important it is for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to adopt a lynx recovery plan here in the Southern Rockies and to identify and protect critical lynx habitat.