Green Mountains

Proposed National ParkVermont
Camel's Hump in autumnPhotograph: Niranjan Arminius, CC BY-SA 4.0
All proposed National ParksGreen MountainsCampaign underway
Location
Vermont
Current protection
Green Mountain National Forest
Status
Active advocacy by RESTORE: The North Woods; no bill
Tier
Tier 1 · National Park
In the book
Not featured in Undiscovered America

Why should it be a National Park?

The Green Mountains run the length of Vermont, a long spine of forested ridges and peaks followed by the Long Trail, the oldest long-distance hiking trail in the country. Mount Mansfield and Camel's Hump rise above treeline into rare alpine tundra.

Vermont came within a referendum of having a National Park along this ridge in 1936. The mountains are no less deserving now than when the Park Service drew one up.

The history of National Park Campaigns

In 1935, Vermont's legislature approved the Green Mountain Parkway, a 260-mile scenic road with hiking trails through a 50,000-acre National Park along the ridge, modeled on the Blue Ridge Parkway. Voters rejected it in a March 1936 referendum, and the legislature repealed the act the next year. The Park Service then proposed a Green Mountain National Park of its own, and a bill was before Congress in the session beginning in 1939, but it was never acted on.

Distinct National Park attempts
2 (1935–36 parkway and park; 1939 Green Mountain National Park bill)
Other designation attempts
1 (1936 national monument request)

Sources

  • Vermont State Archives and Records Administration, "1936: The Green Mountain Parkway"
  • Vermont Public, "When Vermont Almost Got A National Park" (2016)
  • National Park Service, Suggested Areas Resumes (1957)
  • Michael Kellett, "A Modest Proposal: We Need More National Parks," Sierra (August 17, 2021)
  • RESTORE: The North Woods, "Create National Parks" (restore.org, 2026)
Know of a campaign? Tell us
  1. 1910

    The Green Mountain Club begins building the Long Trail.

  2. 1932

    Green Mountain National Forest is established.

  3. December 14, 1935

    Vermont's legislature approves the Green Mountain Parkway and a 50,000-acre National Park along the ridge.

  4. March 3, 1936

    Voters, asked to pick an effective date, choose the later one, rejecting the federal offer.

  5. September 1936

    University of Vermont president Guy Bailey asks for a national monument on the Winooski–Lamoille section; it is disapproved.

  6. February 5, 1937

    The legislature repeals the parkway act.

  7. 1939

    A Park Service-backed Green Mountain National Park bill is before Congress but is not acted on.

  8. 2020s

    RESTORE: The North Woods works with Vermonters for a Green Mountain National Park.

  9. August 17, 2021

    The New National Parks campaign proposes a 410,000-acre Green Mountain National Park to end industrial logging on the national forest.