Grand Canyon

Tribal vs. NPS Jurisdiction at Grand Canyon: How the Map Works

Eleven tribes border or hold rights inside the park, and two boundary lines — Hualapai and Navajo — are still legally disputed with NPS.

Cutaway illustration of a breccia pipe uranium mine shaft cutting through Grand Canyon rock layers into a perched aquifer, with pumps and a haul truck at the surface

Uranium mining around the Grand Canyon: mines, monument, and 2026

How uranium in Grand Canyon breccia pipes led to a 2012 mining withdrawal, a 2023 tribal-backed national monument, and Pinyon Plain Mine, still pumping and mining ore in 2026.

Illustrated Colorado River cutaway shows a gage, submerged sand, survey boat, and plant plots under canyon walls.

USGS river science infrastructure in Grand Canyon

Gages, sediment samplers, sandbar surveys and plant plots measure how dam operations and tributary floods change the Colorado River.

Labeled cross-section cutaway of the Bright Angel Trail corridor showing the buried waterline, the pipe-pole telephone line, and later electrical conduit all running side by side down the same narrow shelf of ground

Utility Tunnels, Conduits and Buried Infrastructure at Grand Canyon

There’s no secret tunnel network. There is a 1926 buried power cable, a phone line made of pipe, and a shared trail-side corridor a century old.

Illustrated cutaway contrasts snow on the canyon rim with heat at the river, alongside weather and air sampling stations.

What Grand Canyon's Weather and Air Stations Actually Measure

Rim weather, river-corridor research stations and air monitors tell different stories. Historical station counts and missing data are not a live canyon-wide sensor map.

Treasure-map style comic of the Grand Canyon dotted with closed signs at a radio tower, a bat cave, a uranium mine, and a snail habitat.

What's Actually Off-Limits at the Grand Canyon, and Why

The Grand Canyon publishes a 48-page list of places you can’t go. Uranium, asbestos, bats, a snail, sewage lagoons, tribal land, and zero Egyptian cities: here’s what’s closed and the legal reason why.

Illustrated schematic of separate village water, road, power and broadband services operated across the wider canyon region

Who keeps water, roads and broadband running near the canyon?

Tribal governments near the Grand Canyon manage distinct village services. Supai’s water system, Hualapai public works and Hopi utility projects are not park infrastructure.

Cutaway map illustration of a canyon cliff face showing a permitted researcher entering one labeled cave while dozens of other cave openings nearby are shown blocked and unlabeled

Why almost every Grand Canyon cave is legally off-limits

A 1988 federal law makes cave locations confidential; the park’s own rule goes further and requires a permit just to walk in.

Illustrated diagram of a government document with several paragraphs covered by black redaction bars, a magnifying glass hovering over labeled arrows pointing to location, character, and ownership fields

Why Grand Canyon Cultural Closures Give No Details

The federal laws — ARPA, NHPA Section 304, NAGPRA — that make withholding site details legal, not evasive.

Illustrated canyon cross-section contrasts a North Rim bison corral with a fish weir in a creek and a condor overhead

Wildlife-management infrastructure: corrals, weirs and field tests

How Grand Canyon managers use bison corrals, fish weirs and research exclosures—and why the regional condor release pen is outside the park.