Making Recreation on Public Lands More Accessible

This Article reflects upon Professor John Copeland Nagle’s scholarship on public land with an emphasis on how his work might extend to the issue of accessibility. Professor John Copeland Nagle was a talented yet humble man of deep kindness and religious convictions. In addition to being a fabulous human being, John was a wonderful scholar. John’s work will endure beyond his life to provide answers and guide future generations. In this Article, we trace how John’s work provides a model with which others can engage to enact reform on public lands with direct effects on overburdened populations. How does the enduring relevance of national parks and recreation on public lands depend upon continuous, iterative updating of law and policy to support users who traditionally had limited access to the parks?Part I discusses how John’s work on national parks and recreation elevated a seldom studied area of law into a more robust field. Reading his work on national parks and recreation collectively provides a framework for understanding how disputes within public lands and the recreational resources are resolved. We show how John’s careful doctrinal work developed a model of how law works in this realm, which can be applied to future and emerging issues.Part II discusses the need for more accessible recreation. People of color, people with disabilities, women, and LGBTQ+ people userecreational resources at lower rates because of fear, discrimination, and historically exclusive practices. We outline types of accessibility within the recreation resource. We further analyze the recreation/conservation dichotomy, arguing that lack of accessibility is contrary to the rationale underlying public provision of the recreation resource.Part III advances a modest proposal for creating more accessible recreation in the National Park Service and the National Trails System. By expanding John’s work to trails, we find that the shape, purpose, and location of trails make trails particularly suitable for accessible recreation. Additionally, increased availability of information and technology continues to allow people to enjoy public lands.Through this analysis we seek to show how John’s foundational work in National Parks law and recreation can and should inform present and future questions