Gulf Islands National Seashore has begun a comprehensive study that will ultimately decide whether personal watercraft can cruise through seashore waters.Following a federal court order in 2010, the seashore is launching a $400,000 environmental impact study with two public informational meetings Nov. 18 and 19 — one in its Florida district and one in its Mississippi district.The meetings, conducted in an informal open house format, will provide six preliminary alternatives for public review and comment to watercraft use in its park waters.Those options include banning personal watercraft or allowing them to operate with stepped up resource protection measures.They were developed by seashore and National Park Service staff along with the seashore’s environmental and science consulting firm Louis Berger Group, said Dan Brown, seashore superintendent.“We are requesting public comment and input to refine those alternatives,” Brown said. “We want to know their thoughts.”Currently, personal watercraft are allowed in seashore waters with certain restrictions.Public input will be used to finalize a draft of the environmental impact statement document that will be released for public review in the spring or summer of 2014. U.S. District Court Judge Gladys Kessler ruled in 2010 that a 2004 federal study stating that personal watercraft would not impair natural resources was deficient. The study led to exempting the Gulf Islands National Seashore from a National Park Service ban on personal watercraft in 2006.Kessler’s 2010 order was the culmination of 10 years of work by the plaintiffs — Friends of the Earth, The Wilderness Society and other groups — to protect park resources. Their efforts were hotly debated by the personal watercraft industry.Brown said Kessler ruled the seashore’s findings were not based on adequate data such as determining the number of personal watercraft that ply seashore waters.Kessler also questioned why the National Park Service allows personal watercraft despite data in its study acknowledging they negatively affect water and air quality, wildlife, visitor use and safety.This time around, the seashore is conducting surveys to calculate more accurate data on the personal watercraft use in the seashore, along with evaluating the impacts of the watercraft on seagrass beds, air and water quality, and wildlife and visitor experience in terms of noise pollution, Brown said.

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