In order to provide additional opportunity for public input, the Coast Guard today announced that it is reopening the comment period through March 31, 2022 on its preparation of an Alaskan Arctic Coast Port Access Route Study to evaluate the need for establishing vessel routing measures. The Coast Guard specifically cited the impact of COVID on travel in providing more time for public meetings in impacted Arctic communities.
Through the study, the Coast Guard says it will enhance navigational safety by analyzing current vessel patterns, predicting future vessel needs, and balancing the needs of all waterway users by developing and recommending vessel routing measures for the Arctic Coast.
The Coast Guard is particularly interested in identifying specific locations, times, or instances where future vessel activity could increase significantly in density or cause specific undesirable consequences, with specific areas of concern including times and/or locations where vessel operations could cause significant consequences to species of concern, subsistence activities, marine mammal migration routes, or other equities, areas of known biological importance and whether they are important year-round or only at specific times, and offshore areas identified or expected to have high potential for oil and natural gas, renewable energy, or seabed resource development.
