The Wilderness Act of 1964 established a National Wilderness Preservation System to benefit the nation as a whole. This landmark conservation legislation established for the American people an enduring resource of wilderness. There are many recognized reasons for wilderness preservation. Wildlands have ecological and economic values that are vital to our society's physical and economic health and the world's body of knowledge. Wilderness protects watersheds upon which many cities and rural communities depend for pure water.
Wilderness improves air quality through the filtering actions of their green plants and forest.
Wilderness maintains the diversity of the gene pools of plant and animal life, a valuable resource for future scientists. Wilderness provides areas for present and future generations to study geological history. Wilderness serves as a unique repository for cultural resources and human history. Visiting Wilderness Travel in Wilderness is limited to non-mechanical means such as foot or horseback, with mules, llamas, or other stock. This allows visitors some of the experience of traveling through our country in a time before roads, telephones, automobiles.