Cedar Creek & Belle Grove National Historical Park71쪽 중 16쪽
Cedar Creek & Belle Grove: What a 2024 Assessment Found About Views, Dark Skies and Sound
A view across a rural landscape in Cedar Creek & Belle Grove National Historical Park, with Strasburg, Virginia, in the distance. Photo: NPS NRCA Program.
At Cedar Creek & Belle Grove National Historical Park the night sky is, on average, 392% brighter than a natural one, according to modeled data. That is one result of a Natural Resource Condition Assessment (NRCA), which looked at five resources in this Shenandoah Valley park in Virginia, where a Civil War battle helped bring the war to an end. The park covers 3,708 acres, is about 87 miles west of Washington, D.C. and is a partner park: sites such as Belle Grove Plantation and Cedar Creek Battlefield are owned and run independently of the National Park Service. The park managers picked visual resources, night sky, soundscape, woodlands and meadows. For three, the team did a condition assessment; for two, where data were lacking, a gap analysis that shows what is known and not and how to fill in the rest.
Findings
| Resource | Result |
|---|---|
| Visual resources | Good/fair at two of the three viewpoints studied and fair at the third. Development outside the park is the main cause of detractions. The first inventory of its kind, so no trend is known. |
| Night sky | Fair. Nearby residential and commercial development and road lighting add light, and air pollution may too; the park's visibility is only fair based on a five-year (2014–2018) haze index. |
| Soundscape | Poor park-wide, from a model of midsummer daytime sound. Known noise sources are highways and roads, construction and a new outdoor firing range outside the park. No current data from the park exist. |
| Woodlands | Condition could not be determined for lack of current data. About 39% of the park. |
| Meadows | Condition could not be assessed for lack of data. About 52% of the park. |
Thoburn's Redoubt Trailhead, one of the viewpoints rated good/fair. Park astronomy events take place at night at this location. Photo: NPS.
Details
- Night sky. The team used modeled data for the all-sky light pollution ratio, a measure of the share of night sky light that comes from humans. The park holds public star parties with the Shenandoah Astronomical Society.
- Soundscape. Highway noise can intrude on a visitor imagining the battle of October 19, 1864 along the Morning Attack Trail.
- Woodlands. At least 12 non-native invasive plant species occur in or next to the woods: eight rank “high” and four “medium” on the Virginia Invasive Plant Species List. Two invasive insects, the emerald ash borer and the spotted lanternfly, have been reported in the park, the first damaging ash trees. Over-browsing by white-tailed deer and climate change also matter.
- Meadows. Agricultural fields are being restored to native meadow. The roughly 47-acre Morning Attack Trail field, in restoration since 2016, received native grasses and wildflowers in 2022 to create habitat for grassland birds and pollinators, reduce invasive plants and improve the viewshed. As of mid-2023 it looked better than when work began, and a monitoring effort of at least five years is tracking its plants.
The Morning Attack Trail field, where NPS has planted native grasses and wildflowers and is controlling non-native vegetation. Photo: NPS/Nathan Wender.
What the assessment suggests
The team gave management considerations for each resource. Park partners could work out priority viewpoints and tools for protecting them with landowners. Managers could reduce artificial light by reviewing NPS lighting and sharing information with partners and local governments. An acoustic monitoring project would give a baseline for the soundscape. For woodlands and meadows, they need data on the insect pests, deer browsing, invasive plants and whether woods encroach on historical views of the battlefield.
Sources
- National Park Service, Condition of Selected Natural Resources at Cedar Creek & Belle Grove National Historical Park: 2024 Assessment, summarizing P. Valentine-Darby and others, Natural Resource Conditions at Cedar Creek & Belle Grove National Historical Park: Findings and Management Considerations for Selected Resources (2024); rewritten in hubnx's own words.