## Facts

- The National Park Service (NPS) managed winter use in Yellowstone National Park, Grand Teton National Park, and the John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Memorial Parkway.
- Snowmobiles had been permitted for decades; by the 1990s, peak winter days involved roughly 1,700 snowmobiles.
- The National Park Service Organic Act and related statutes require NPS to conserve park resources and avoid impairment, favoring conservation when it conflicts with visitor use.
- Following earlier litigation and environmental review, NPS issued a 2001 final rule and related decision documents that would phase out snowmobiles in favor of snowcoaches.
- After an administrative change, NPS stayed that approach and issued a 2003 Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS) and a March 2003 Record of Decision (ROD) allowing continued snowmobiling and trail grooming, authorizing up to 950 snowmobiles per day.
- Environmental plaintiffs alleged snowmobiling and grooming caused air and noise pollution, threatened visitor and employee health, and harmed wildlife, including through effects associated with groomed trails.
- Separately, Bluewater Network filed a January 1999 rulemaking petition seeking a systemwide ban on snowmobiling and trail grooming; NPS had not issued a final response by late 2003.
- The parties filed cross-motions for summary judgment challenging the 2003 SEIS/ROD under NEPA and the APA, and alleging unreasonable delay on the 1999 petition.

## Issues

1. Whether NPS’s 2003 SEIS and ROD authorizing continued snowmobiling and trail grooming were arbitrary and capricious under the APA, given the prior phase-out decision and the administrative record.
2. Whether the 2003 SEIS complied with NEPA’s requirements to take a hard look at environmental effects and to consider reasonable alternatives, including ending trail grooming.
3. Whether NPS unreasonably delayed responding to the 1999 rulemaking petition, warranting judicial compulsion of agency action.

## Decision

- The court granted summary judgment to the environmental plaintiffs on the principal APA and NEPA challenges to the 2003 SEIS and ROD.
- The court held the 2003 decision was arbitrary and capricious because NPS failed to provide a reasoned explanation for reversing course in light of its prior findings and the evidentiary record.
- The court held the 2003 SEIS violated NEPA by failing to give serious consideration to reasonable alternatives, including cessation of trail grooming.
- The court vacated the 2003 SEIS and 2003 ROD and remanded to NPS for further proceedings consistent with the opinion.
- The court found unreasonable delay in NPS’s lack of a final response to the 1999 petition and ordered NPS to respond by February 17, 2004.

## Legal Principles

- Under the APA, agency action is unlawful if arbitrary and capricious, including where the agency fails to examine relevant data and articulate a rational connection between facts found and choices made.
- When an agency changes policy, it must provide a reasoned explanation that addresses prior findings and shows the change is deliberate rather than an unexplained reweighing of the same record.
- NEPA requires an agency to take a hard look at environmental consequences and to evaluate reasonable alternatives; an SEIS is deficient if it omits serious analysis of an obvious, less harmful alternative supported by the record.
- Courts may compel agency action under the APA when agency inaction constitutes unreasonable delay, particularly where prolonged delay affects statutorily protected conservation interests.

## Conclusion

The court set aside NPS’s 2003 winter-use approval for Yellowstone-area parks because the agency inadequately justified its reversal from a snowmobile phase-out and failed to analyze key NEPA alternatives, and it required a prompt agency response to a long-pending petition seeking broader restrictions on snowmobiling and trail grooming.


The Fund for Animals v. Norton, 294 F. Supp. 2d 92 (D.D.C. 2003)