Brian Maffly
Salt Lake Tribune
Salt Lake City, UT, United States
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Recent articles by Brian:
Feds approve master plan for Utah’s Alta Ski Resort calling for controversial upgrades
A small tram, capable of moving 150 skiers an hour to the top of one of the Central Wasatch’s highest peaks, could be in store for Alta Ski Area under a master plan approved this week by the U.S. Forest Service. → Read More
Feds announce new meetings on the future of Utah’s redrawn national monuments
More than three months after President Donald Trump ordered the reduction of Utah’s two large national monuments, the Interior Department has scheduled meetings in the state to gather public feedback on how the redrawn monuments will be managed. → Read More
Ute Tribe takes U.S. government to court over ‘theft’ of land and water in historic Uncompahgre
More than a century ago, the U.S. government made several promises to the Ute Indian Tribe when it evicted the Uncompahgre and White River bands from fertile homelands in Colorado in a largely failed effort to resettle tribal members to Utah’s Uinta Basin, though the arid land was ill-suited for farming. → Read More
Outside the public eye, feds poised to grant millions of dollars in tax royalty relief to struggling Utah coal mines
Utah’s largest coal producer is seeking a tax royalty reduction potentially worth millions of dollars on what it owes for federal coal leases mined at the Sufco Mine outside Salina, yet virtually no information is publicly available regarding the request. → Read More
Study: Halting federal public-lands leases for oil, gas and coal — including in Utah — would reduce climate-changing emissions
In the final years of the Obama administration, climate activists rallied hard against new leasing of federal oil, gas and coal reserves, arguing that leaving those resources on U.S. public lands undeveloped would reduce carbon emissions and slow planetary warming. → Read More
Feds approve uranium mine expansions in Utah’s San Juan County, one of them near Bears Ears
The Bureau of Land Management has issued final approvals for two uranium mine expansions in southeast Utah, including one on the backdoor of what used to be Bears Ears National Monument. → Read More
A search for an ancient crocodile in Utah’s Bears Ears leads to a major discovery of Triassic fossils
Paleontologist Robert Gay’s quest to find the fossilized remains of an ancient phytosaur, a primitive ancestor to crocodiles, turned into something much larger last summer when he came upon a major trove of Triassic fossils on public lands recently stripped from Utah’s Bears Ears National Monument. → Read More
New app TerraTRUTH lets users report damage they see on Utah’s public lands
Conservation groups have developed a new mobile application that lets users to document and report damage they might witness on public lands. → Read More
How the future of Utah’s coal industry rests with a federal judge in San Francisco
After years of study, three Utah coal mines are poised to expand into new federally leased lands that promise to keep them humming for another decade, securing hundreds of treasured mining jobs in rural communities. → Read More
Adventure vs. clean water: Surging foot traffic to popular Utah canyon poses a challenge for Iron County
Kanarraville • Visitors to a popular southern Utah hiking destination may soon require a permit and have to pay a fee under a plan Iron County is developing to address overuse in Kanarraville Canyon. → Read More
National parks need money — but raising entry fees could backfire
The American public loves national parks, even as some destinations are becoming snarled in traffic and hikers pack places such as Zion’s Emerald Pools and River Walk and Arches’ Devil’s Garden. → Read More
Do low snow totals bode ill for Utah skiing in 2018?
Brighton • On a typical New Year’s Day, David Lind would be surfing the South Pacific, but this year he found himself on the slopes of a Utah ski area that is facing some of its thinnest snow cover in decades. → Read More
Moab tour operator tries to block 28 tourists from suing over boat crash injuries
An aluminum jet boat left a Moab dock last summer for a sunset excursion down the Colorado River with a full load of 28 mostly older passengers, tourists on a Utah vacation. → Read More
By renaming new Utah monument Shash Jaa, is Trump trying to divide Native American tribes?
President Donald Trump not only trimmed and broke up the Bears Ears National Monument when he visited Utah last week. He also renamed it with the Navajo-language term for Bears Ears, a gesture that could be courting trouble with many Native Americans. → Read More
What’s in, what’s out of Utah’s new monuments
Where Utah once had two large national monuments, the state now has five smaller ones under an order signed Monday by President Donald Trump — but several high-value sites the original monuments were designed to protect are left out. → Read More
Have an opinion about the proposed fee hikes for popular national parks? The comment period has been extended
In the face of intense public interest, much of it critical, the National Park Service is giving people more time to weigh in on its controversial proposal to boost entrance fees to $70 per vehicle at its most popular parks, including four in Utah. → Read More
Feds, locals worry annual Moab event creates ‘circus atmosphere’ in scenic Utah land
More than a dozen lines of webbing have been carefully strung across the side chute to Mineral Canyon, known as the Fruit Bowl, creating a kind of inverted cathedral for those who like to strut their balancing prowess hundreds of feet off terra firma. → Read More
What does Kane County want in a redrawn Grand Straircase-Escalante monument?
When Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke announced he would visit Kanab last spring, Kane County officials knew they had a rare opportunity to influence the changes he might suggest for Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument. The 1996 designation of the 1.9-million-acre monument still angers many of their friends and neighbors. → Read More
Ire-inspiring gravel-pit parcel doesn’t sell in Utah trust land auction
Wednesday’s auction of Utah trust parcels proved a dull affair, reaping hardly $1 million for the school trust fund. → Read More
Grand Staircase-Escalante monument will be pruned by half, Hatch official says
President Donald Trump will shrink the Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument by about half, to a size between 700,000 and 1.2 million acres, following the recommendation of his Interior secretary, according to a staffer for Sen. Orrin Hatch. → Read More