Eight years passed while a diverse group of Missoula, Montana, residents worked their way through the controversies to find compromise. And now the 13,000-acre Marshall Woods Restoration Project is finally approved and starting to take shape.
The to-do list includes commercial harvesting, tree thinning, prescribed fire and recreational improvements in several areas just north of the Missoula city limits, in the Rattlesnake National Recreation Area.
The intent is to restore native vegetation, promote forest health and reduce the wildfire danger at the head of a narrow, heavily populated valley.