Environmental groups sue to stop tours on Cumberland Island

ATLANTA - Three conservation groups sued the National Park Service Monday to try to stop vanloads of tourists from driving in federally protected areas on Georgia&#39;s Cumberland Island. <br> <br> The lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Washington by Wilderness Watch, Defenders of Wild Cumberland and Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility claims the National Park Service and a hotel on the island are breaking the law by running motorized vehicles into a designated national wilderness area. <br> <br> ``It sets a terrible precedent for (federally protected) wilderness everywhere and flies in the face of the Wilderness Act,&#39;&#39; said George Nickas, executive director of Missoula, Mont.-based Wilderness Watch. <br> <br> Arthur Frederick, the Cumberland Island superintendent, said the Park Service will stop taking vans full of tourists into the protected wilderness this year as part of new management guidelines being developed. <br> <br> Tourists will continue to visit the protected north end of the island, the site of a historic black settlement, but will be taken by boat instead, he said. <br> <br> But the Greyfield Inn, a resort hotel on the island, is allowed to continue tours because it was grandfathered in when the area was designated a national wilderness in 1982. <br> <br> ``The Greyfield Inn has been conducting tours since about the mid-&#39;60s. That activity predates the wilderness (designation),&#39;&#39; Frederick said, adding that the new guidelines will further regulate the hotel&#39;s use of the area. <br> <br> Coleman Langshaw, one of the owners of the Greyfield, said he&#39;d like to continue the daily van tours, which use only the main road that runs north to south on the island. Tourists leave that road only on foot, he said. <br> <br> Langshaw said the rules that come with the national wilderness designation are difficult to enforce because of access agreements that were negotiated with the Greyfield and other private landowners. He said the designation ``is ill-suited to the present situation.&#39;&#39; <br> <br> ``There is no threat to the land,&#39;&#39; said Gogo Ferguson, whose grandparents opened the inn. ``I don&#39;t understand the huge problem here. It seems to be totally distorted into something that isn&#39;t happening down here.&#39;&#39; <br> <br> Cumberland Island lies off of Georgia&#39;s southeast coast, the largest undeveloped barrier island on the eastern seaboard. The island was designated a national seashore in 1972, and a decade later 8,800 acres of its north end was designated by Congress as the Cumberland Island Wilderness. <br> <br> The island provides shelter for more than 300 species of birds and nesting sites for sea turtles, including the threatened loggerhead. <br> <br> The new management guidelines, expected to be in place in about six months, will sharply limit all uses of motorized vehicles on the island, even by rangers and curators, Frederick said.