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Andy what can I do to help? I know how great the site is and would hate to see it reclaimed. I am about to start a tenure-track position at Wright State Lake Campus and would love to run a field trip to Alabama, including the site in the future. Chuck Ciampaglio At 05:56 PM 7/30/2003 -0500, you wrote: >Folks, > >The Union Chapel site, which has yielded more than 1200 slabs of Early >Pennsylvanian (Westphalian A) tetrapod trackways in the past 3 years, is >about to be buried if reclamation is not halted in time. (I should state at >the outset that I am writing solely as a private citizen, not in my capacity >as a state employee. This is not to be construed as an official >communication.) > >The owners of this coalmine and the Alabama Surface Mining Commission have >cooperated with the Alabama Paleontological Society (APS) and researchers >from several universities to delay reclamation, insofar as federal >regulations have allowed them to do so. In May, amateurs and professionals >met in a Workshop on Permo-Carboniferous Ichnology to study the tracks, >visit the site, and present work on related material. They agreed on the >signal importance of this site to science. Hartmut Haubold (Universitaet >Halle) considers it to be the richest tracksite of Carboniferous age in the >world. A multiauthored book on the site is well under way, and hundreds of >photographs of trackways have been posted on the Web. > >Spearheaded by Prescott Atkinson, M.D., the APS has been trying to preserve >the Union Chapel site for science and education. We envision a site where >further collections can be made, and where the tracks can be gathered under >one roof for study and display. Dr. Atkinson's qualifications are >impeccable. He is a medical researcher at the University of Alabama at >Birmingham, and has cooperated fully with state museums. > >The Society's efforts have reached the public in several newspaper articles, >and US Congressman Robert Aderholt has entered a bill to preserve the site. >The owners are cooperative, but another person has an option to buy the >land, and so the highwall will be shot down and the site buried within 30 >days unless a court order can halt the action. Under US law, the Alabama >Surface Mining Commission has no choice but to oversee the reclamation. An >injunction would buy time for Congressional action. > >If you feel that your research, or your opportunities to teach or to lead >field trips, would be affected by reclamation of the Union Chapel site, then >please write a letter to support Prescott Atkinson at: >PAtkinson@peds.uab.edu . > >Thanks, >Andrew K. Rindsberg > >++++++++++++++++++++++++++ > >For more information, see: > >Prescott Atkinson biography >http://www.cmb.uab.edu/faculty/atkinson/Biography.html > >Book-in-progress on Union Chapel trackways and paleoenvironment; >Photographic atlas >http://bama.ua.edu/~rbuta/monograph/ > >Workshop on Permo-Carboniferous Ichnology >http://bama.ua.edu/~rbuta/ucm/ucm.html > >Chronology of Union Chapel events and bibliography to July 2002 >http://kudzu.astr.ua.edu/sitevisit/UCMbib.html > >Field trip reports of the Birmingham Paleontological Society (now APS) >http://www.westga.edu/~bpsweb/BPS_Trips/bps_field_trips.html > >NAPC abstract by Rindsberg, Martin & Pyenson on ichnology of site >http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/napc/abs20.html > >GSA abstract by S. Hood on xiphosuran trackways >http://gsa.confex.com/gsa/2002NC/finalprogram/abstract_32459.htm > >Emory University abstract by N. Pyenson on tetrapod trackways >http://www.sciencenet.emory.edu/undergrad/SURE/Posters/2001_pyenson.html
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