Everglades National Park

Like No Other

No exaggeration, there really is no other place in the world like the Everglades. Always a little mysterious but never completely off the radar of our national consciousness, Everglades National Park contains some of the most exotic wild animals and plantlife in our part of the world, living together in a very unusual ecosystem. There are dozens of endangered species here, and the chance to see them in their natural habitat is one of the major drawing points of this park. Lurking in the swamps of the Everglades are rareties such as:

• American Crocodiles
• the Florida Panther
• the southern bald eagle
• the West Indian manatee
• the leatherback turtle
• and the swallowtail butterfly

Forget what you’ve seen on CSI Miami, that’s just the face of the Everglades. When you visit the Park, you’ll see that there’s so much more: a strange exotic feeling you get slowly moving through the flat river trails, catching glimpses of quiet native animals who manage to survive in the heat, the humidity, the watery knots of trails that make up Everglades Park.

The Park

Everglades National Park is actually one huge river moving so gradually you can hardly see movement at all. Imagine a river that’s forty miles wide, hardly two feet deep, and teeming with life and you’ve got the Everglades. The Park protects 1.5 million acres, which represents only about one-fifth of the total Everglades wilderness, with the rest succumbing to development, agriculture, and general misuse, sadly. To pile insult on top of injury, Everglades serve as the drainage basin for Southern Florida (think agricultural pesticides, fertilizers, Miami, industrial plants…), existing side by side in close inter-connetivity with surrounding regions. Unfortunately, this means that even though the Park protects what’s inside its borders, it can’t stop pollutants from entereing in the waters that drain from parts north. Consequently, native wildlife counts have decreased lately. That’s not to say it’s a ghost town…visit and you’ll see tiny tree frogs, orchids, lizards, and if you’re lucky you’ll see one of the endangered species mentioned earlier. Although you may not be able to pinpoint exactly what excites you about the Everglades and the subtle slow-moving beauty they bring, you’ll never forget it, and you’ll certainly be entranced while you’re there, and you may even want to go back again and again.

Flight to Key West

Everglades National Park has three entrances from land and one main entrance area with facilities from the water. These are:

• Gulf Coast Visitor Center, on the northwest tip of the Park
• Shark Valley Visitor Center, on the northern central edge of the Park
• Ernest F. Coe Visitor Center, on the eastern edge of the Park
• Royal Palm Visitor Center, just a few miles inside the Homestead entrance to the Park, after Ernest Coe Visitor Center
• Big Cypress National Preserve Visitor Center, in Big Cypress National Preserve, next to Everglades National Park
• Flamingo Visitor Center, on the southern coast, accessible by water and via Ernest F. Coe Visitor Center

Each of these entrances and visitor centers offers a different angle on the Everglades, and depending on where you’re driving from, and what you plan to do, each one offers different activities as well.

Bulletin Board at Everglades National Park

In Everglades National Park news today there are careful plans in action, with cooperating agencies from all levels of government and the private sector, as well as tribal leaders in Southern Florida. Working together are the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the South Florida Water Management District and several other federal, state, local and tribal leaders. Together, they manage comprehensive plans for water management in the Florida Everglades, working under the guise of three official projects:

• Water Resources Development Act (WRDA)
• Central and Southern Florida Project
• Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP)

Central and Southern Florida Project

The Central and Southern Florida Project is the first overall Everglades planning conservation effort by local and federal government. It was autorized by Congress in 1948 and seeks to:

• Manage and improve flood control
• Safeguard water supply for municipal, industrial, and agricultural uses
• Maintain prevention of saltwater intrusion
• Protect the water supply for Everglades National Park
• Protect fish and wildlife resources in the Everglades

Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP)
Water Resources Development Act (WRDA)