Interior to Reassess Utah Highway Impact on Endangered Tortoise

A federal judge is making the Interior Department and two sub-agencies, at their request, reevaluate the effects of a highway project on an endangered tortoise in southwest Utah.

Environmental groups, including Conserve Southwest Utah and the Center for Biological Diversity, challenged decisions from Interior’s Bureau of Land Management and Fish and Wildlife Service to grant a right-of way to the Utah Department of Trasnportation for a four-lane highway through the Red Cliffs National Conservation Area and critical habitat for the Mojave desert tortoise.

They said the environmental analyses were insufficient, failing to consider the impact of multiple factors including fires ...