The Burning Man Project has announced that they are entering the preliminary stages of a development plan for the 4000 acre Fly Ranch, a property close to Black Rock City with a natural hot springs and a beautiful geyser. The Project describe the property as one of the “Wonders of Northern Nevada”. Their intention seems to be creating a year-round community there.
For years, members of the Burning Man organization have championed the vision of an artistic and ecological community, founded on the Ten Principles of Burning Man, on the Fly Ranch property. Nestled on the edge of the Hualapai Valley on the northeast corner of the Black Rock Desert of Nevada, this 4,000 acre site contains an abundance of natural resources and wonders that will serve as a world class ecological heritage site and living arts community.
The Burning Man Project is pleased to announce the initiation of the preliminary stages of the development of the Fly Geyser property. This exploratory phase involves negotiating agreements for the rights to the property, producing a request for proposal to generate feasibility studies and geological analysis regarding the use and development of the land. Following negotiation and due diligence, and with an agreement on purchase conditions, the Project will move on to the exciting next stages.
The Fly Ranch Project Plan, still in development, will consist of several phases. The first is the current exploratory and negotiation phase. The first priority will be preservation and access—as development of infrastructure begins, the public will be able to access the geyser area for the first time in many years. Access will be coupled with preservation measures. Early evidence of Project involvement with the property will be the appearance of art in the area—the first pieces of a planned world-class art and sculpture park.
Future phases and plans could involve other avenues to promote public interaction with the high desert environment—a more fully developed art park, camping facility, conference center, and an alternative energy showcase are components of the Project’s vision for the area.
The Burning Man Project plans are for use of the area in a sustainable manner, while working to protect this ecologically unique resource. With nearly 4,000 acres of varied ecology, the Fly Springs Project will preserve the most fragile components of this ecosystem, the Fly Geyser, while providing opportunities for enhanced human interaction with the ecosystem, including artistic, ecological, and technological components.
The Fly Ranch Project presents unlimited opportunities and challenges. We seek to unlock human creativity in this remote yet inspiring setting, yet we must tread lightly on the land so that its grandeur will endure for generations to come. We are excited to be beginning what we hope will be a great journey to bring the wonders of Northern Nevada to the Burning Man community and the public at large.
They’ve been thinking about developing this property for ages, and now they’re entering into a preliminary phase to consider what to do with it. What does this actually mean? It’s hard to say, but we wish them luck with their project anyway. The geyser sure is purty.
The latest JRS announces Burning Man’s new FAQ for Vehicle Passes. Unfortunately, it raises more questions than it answers.
Usually, FAQ’s are there to make it easier for the user; they achieve this by putting all the frequently asked questions and answers in one place, so you can quickly get the information you need. Burning Man’s one is more like a library, you have to dig into each individual question to get the answer, and the answers seem to be conflicting in some cases. They also provide another FAQ about this in a different section of their web site, with different information again.
We’ve been through them all, to try to piece together a clear picture of what the rules actually are. Here are some of the issues we see:
This says “In 2014 every vehicle entering Black Rock City will be required to have a Vehicle Pass”. The wording is different from the FAQ on their blog (which is another FAQ in a different section of their web site, with different information), which says:
Q. Do I have to pay for a Vehicle Pass for my Mutant Vehicle? A. If you are bringing your Mutant Vehicle in on a trailer, you do not need to have a Vehicle Pass for it. If you are driving it in, you need a Pass. Each stand-alone vehicle that drives through the gate must have a Vehicle Pass.
This is much more clear. Every vehicle that DRIVES in needs the pass – except, jumping back to yet another section of these sprawling FAQs, motorcycles. Art cars don’t need one if they’re on a trailer, they will still need to register with the Department of Mutant Vehicles though.
The blog FAQ, however, says the jury’s still out on motorcycles:
Q. Do motorcycles have to pay for a Vehicle Pass? A. To be determined, but not at this time.
Without any limit on the number of passes the program would be pretty much meaningless. We must make some real progress on addressing the traffic issue and we need everyone to be part of the solution.
The program appears to be relatively meaningless anyway, since it is capping the number of vehicles at about what last year’s was, and doing nothing to prevent single-occupancy vehicles. Not only that, later in this edition of their vehicle pass FAQ’s, they say:
Based on demand, we may also have a separate late-season Vehicle Pass only sale.
…which seems to be leaving the door open for more vehicle passes in an “OMG! Vehicle Pass sale” if the program causes problems. A good thing for Burners, if people are screaming that they can’t get to the event because they have 4 people who want to go in one vehicle, but none of them can get a pass.
As for everyone being part of the solution, we’ve seen lots of great ideas from Burners online, such as offering vehicles with 3 or more passengers in for free, or a discount; or making high polluting RVs or single-occupancy vehicles pay more. The main problem with these ideas seems to be a financial one, rather than to do with their practicality.
Back to the “other” FAQ:
Q. Why not have an HOV (high occupancy vehicle) lane for cars with multiple passengers? A. An HOV lane is under consideration but comes with its own logistical challenges (like having a way to prevent low occupancy vehicles from using the lane).
…so, as many Burners have pointed out in the online discussions about this, their vehicle pass system does not prevent low/single occupancy vehicles in any way.
Q. Why not just charge a larger fee for RVs? A. The issue isn’t the size or type of the vehicle but the number of vehicles using roads leading to the event — regardless of what kind of vehicle you drive, it’s another vehicle creating traffic and doing damage to the roads. We need all participants to examine how they get to and from the playa and work together to reduce traffic on the highways. Other large events have a footprint shortage. For now, we don’t. It’s our roadways that are limited.
This spells it out. There’s no shortage of room for Burners at the event, only a limit to size from the highways. They really are not concerned with emissions, or encouraging ride sharing. They just want an easy way for them to cap the number of vehicles (and make another million or two by doing so)…so that the population cap can increase. It appears the roadways being full is now the main impediment to them selling more tickets. As Maid Marian said in 2012, “the desert could accomodate 100,000 people”. It’s just the roads that can’t. 40,000 more tickets would be another $15,200,000 to this “non” profit – without any additional costs, this would go straight to their bottom line.
What about people with Low-Income Tickets? Confusingly, we have a couple of differentanswers for them to choose from:
If you have been accepted to the Low Income Ticket Program you will be given the option of purchasing a Vehicle Pass when you pay for your ticket
and
If you are awarded a Low Income ticket and need a vehicle pass, you may purchase one at the box office when you pick up your Low Income ticket at will call.
This seems to be two different answers to a single question. And it raises another point: they’ll be selling vehicle passes at the gate. It’d be awfully tempting for someone to let a few more in…who’s counting the counters? The vehicles are off the road at that point, sending them back onto the road would just make the situation worse. Much worse! Each additional 2500 vehicle passes is another $100,000…cash.
What about the big question? Can you buy more vehicle passes than tickets? Well, they haven’t done anything to clear up their confusing language, and they don’t directly address it, but reading between the lines, it appears that – as we predicted – yes, you can.
you may buy up to as many Vehicle Passes as the maximum allowable number of tickets you may purchase in any given sale, i.e. in the Pre-Sale the ticket limit is up to four (4) per person, hence you could buy up to four (4) Vehicle Passes, and in all other sales the ticket limit is up to two (2) per person and you may buy up to two (2) Vehicle Passes
What if I am gifted a ticket? How should I buy a Vehicle Passes?
If you are gifted a ticket you may register for a ticket sale and only purchase a vehicle pass. We also anticipate folks will be able to find Vehicle Passes recirculating at face value in the community.
No, at this time we do not have a centralized system for reselling and buying vehicle passes. Participants are encouraged to buy and sell them for face value within the community.
Conclusion? Vehicle passes aren’t linked to vehicles, you can buy them without buying tickets, you can buy 4 at a time if you register now, or 2 at a time in the subsequent sales. Burning Man fully expects there to be an aftermarket for these, and expects that people will be selling them for more than face value – they just “encourage” people not to make profits from them.
Finally, some Burners have suggested that Gerlach might turn into a massive parking lot.
Can I park on the road in Gerlach and walk in to avoid the Vehicle Pass?
No. This is extraordinarily dangerous on many levels (the risk of getting hit by a car, dehydration, sun stroke, exposure, etc.), and counter to the entire purpose of the program to minimize traffic on the roadways impacted by people traveling to Black Rock City.
Although they say “no”, it’s hard to see how they are going to enforce this. Arrest people for walking on Federal land? Limiting access through the gate to only people with motorized vehicles would seem to be counter-productive to the supposed purpose of this new tax.
A month or so ago, I let you know that I was cutting guest writer Whatsblem the Pro loose. You can now find him here. I hope it’s clear now, this is my blog. If you read the tag line it says “Me, Burners, and the Man”. It’s for free, I don’t make money from it, I don’t ask you to give me money, it’s entirely up to you if you want to read this. Hey, if you don’t, then don’t – no skin off my nose.
I’m constantly amazed by the criticism I get, from people who think this free blog should suit their needs better. They don’t want to click the links to stories I’ve already spent hours to write, they just want me to make it simple for them by constantly re-writing the content for the sake of simplicity for the casual reader. For free, of course…“gift me this!”
Well, those ignoramus Burners can get fucked. If you’re still with me, I’m going to use this platform to share my opinions, just like I did when I only had 3 Likes on Facebook. And my opinion is, the most important thing in life on this planet is Habitat Preservation. Steve Irwin style. He’s been dead for 8 years now, and no-one has put their hand up to take his place, to lead the youngsters into a world of respecting the environment.
Forget Leave No Trace® – a registered trademark of the BLM who take $2 million/year from Burners, to generously grant us a permit to throw a party in the desert. They spend that money on dogs and night-vision goggles, all the better to bust us with.
We’re talking about the “fight to save the environment”…That’s what we’re leaving for future generations. If we don’t stand up for Mother Nature, who else will? Oh, you care about “Leave No Trace”, but you don’t care about the environment? WTF is wrong with you? If we turn a blind eye, or think that simply by going to Burning Man, we’re somehow making a difference, then the future of this planet is doomed.
Right now, what’s got my goat is Corey and Amber Knowlton. They just paid (well, he just paid…who knows what sort of pre-nup agreement she got…) $350,000 to murder an endangered black Rhino in Africa.
It’s not just Corey: his wife Amber gets in on the mass slaughter too. Check out these murderers conservationists Christmas card!
Yep, these butchers have two daughters. I hope Santa takes a huge dump down their chimney. These people are scum. The world needs to be made aware of them. They need to be shunned. If I ever see them, I’m going to give them a stern talking to (an understatement!) I hope they never show up at Burning Man, or any other Burner event worldwide. Can you believe that they have a spare $350,000, and what they want to do with that money, is slaughter black rhinos, a species with less than 5000 members on earth?
Corey Knowlton leads a “hunting party”. Why do you need camouflage, when you have telescopic and laser sights?
The take for Burning Man of BMOrg’s new, genius invention of a “vehicle tax” that is supposed to help the environment, is $1.4 million. That’s what the Jacked Rabbit told us, anyway – it’s for our own benefit! Surely it must be true, if it was in Jacked Rabbit.
Last year, there were 35,789 cars at Burning Man, and this new tax will keep 789 cars off the road.That’s about 325 tons of CO2 emissions avoided, or the equivalent of the Man Burn plus fire art burn. For $1.4 million! Really saving the world! These numbers are calculated from the site Jacked Rabbit points us to, coolingman.org. This site was developed in 007 when the theme was “The Green Man”. They claim that if 70% of Burners offset 1 ton of carbon emissions, this could be the world’s first carbon neutral city. Now that seems like a worthy goal!
No matter what I say here, the haters are going to accuse me of being a hater, but this seems like a valid, and easy to realize, objective. BMOrg could set a goal for us all to do that, instead of “keep the number of cars the same, and pay us more”. If we achieved this goal, suggested first 7 years ago and totally ignored by BMOrg ever since, we’d be leading the world environmentally – a zero-net carbon city, which Leaves No Trace® – without us even needing to chip in another $1.4 million to their non-profit for “environmental reasons” (P.S., they really need our donations too, because the party just doesn’t cover it, even with this extra take!)
Imagine if they cut a quarter of those cars out, and took even a tenth of their $30 million+ receipts from their main event…to actually try to benefit environmental causes. They could really make a difference to the world. For a mere $350k, about 1% of Burning Man’s revenues…is one endangered rhino worth as much as 437cows? It’s only a quarter of their latest tax on us. Make the new tax $50 instead of 40, our money could save this beautiful black rhino AND BMOrg could still bank all the extra buck$ they need from their new tax.
Here’s what Jacked Rabbit has to say:
Burning Man is under pressure from the Bureau of Land Management and Nevada Department of Transportation to reduce the number of cars entering the event. Highways 447 and 34 are at max capacity during the event and we’re being asked to pay for road damage caused by participant vehicles. Road travel represents 60% of the carbon emissions related to the event...Clearly, it’s critical we address the traffic issue — and we can only solve this problem by working together as a community.
…Our community has always policed itself — and changed its behavior when necessary — through awareness. That’s how we became the largest Leave No Trace event in the world, against seemingly impossible odds
Errr, impossible? It’s not impossible to ask the local tribes to collect trash from the Exodus line, or during the event. Odds are, this would be a win/win/win for everyone if they introduced it.
If you ask me, pollution is the problem, not people using motorized vehicles to get to a remote location. Does $1.4 million in”bonus” vehicle tax to BMOrg, help Planet Earth – in terms of pollution, senseless waste, rainforest degradation, habitat preservation, saving endangered species? Does it help the environment in any way – seriously, do you think it does? Please share if you can see how it does. Is it even going to get any cars off the road at Burning Man? Surely, our non-profit Burner funds could be spent in a better way to help the environment. $1.4 million for 857 cars? Really? They couldn’t just ask, and get 1000+ cars off the road for free?
Like coolingman says, we could become an exemplar city for the environment, without any new tax, just with some encouragement from BMOrg to Respect The Environment. I know, I know, the Sacred Principle is “Leave No Trace”, which we took from the BLM …but, really? “Respect the Environment” is evil?
I would rather see 1% of Burning Man’s budget – or even merely 1% of the new vehicle tax- going to the crowdsourced BitCoin assassination market, to send a message to these hunters that Black Rock City respects environmental values, and we are against the murder of endangered species. If the Chairman of the Federal Reserve is only worth $90,000, what should the price be on Mr and Mrs Knowlton, and their $350,000 murder prize?
[Update 1/17/2014]
The Endangered Species Assassin is such a Big Dick Man, he’s alerted the FBI and the Las Vegas SWAT team to complaints against his intended murder. According to CNN anyway. He claims that assassinating Endangered Species is in the name of “science”. 5000 black rhino left on earth is a “surplus”, says Corey. He tries to relate his slaughter to “The Price is Wrong Bitch”, and British Agent Piers Morgan’s moves to attack the Second Amendment. I guess it’s all a big joke to him. How come Adam Sandler and co aren’t out there murdering endangered species? The dick acts all “surprised” that now his wife and kids are threatened by snipers. Ummm….duh! Give the rhino a fighting chance, don’t shoot it with a high-powered laser scope. That’s fair, right? Texas rednecks ain’t no endangered species, last time I checked! It’s just like shooting cows…it’s cool as long as you eat them! You gonna eat that Rhino boy? You and your wife gonna take that rhino horn?
For years, members of the Burning Man organization have championed the vision of an artistic and ecological community, founded on the Ten Principles of Burning Man, on the Fly Ranch property. Nestled on the edge of the Hualapai Valley on the northeast corner of the Black Rock Desert of Nevada, this 4,000 acre site contains an abundance of natural resources and wonders that will serve as a world class ecological heritage site and living arts community.
The Burning Man Project is pleased to announce the initiation of the preliminary stages of the development of the Fly Geyser property. This exploratory phase involves negotiating agreements for the rights to the property, producing a request for proposal to generate feasibility studies and geological analysis regarding the use and development of the land. Following negotiation and due diligence, and with an agreement on purchase conditions, the Project will move on to the exciting next stages.
The Fly Ranch Project Plan, still in development, will consist of several phases. The first is the current exploratory and negotiation phase. The first priority will be preservation and access—as development of infrastructure begins, the public will be able to access the geyser area for the first time in many years. Access will be coupled with preservation measures. Early evidence of Project involvement with the property will be the appearance of art in the area—the first pieces of a planned world-class art and sculpture park.
