Fort Frederica National Monument Draft General Management Plan and Environmental Impact Statement

The National Park Service (NPS) has prepared this Draft General Management Plan/Environmental Impact Statement to present alternatives for the management of Fort Frederica National Monument for consideration by the agency, state and local government, and the public. The General Management Plan provides a vision and management framework for the National Monument. The three conceptual alternatives presented in this document are based on park purpose, significance, management goals, and visitor use goals, which in turn are based on the National Monument's enabling legislation and legislative history and on NPS policies. The plan provides a foundation for park management and visitor use and serves as a guide for park programs and priority setting. The alternative that is finally selected will guide the management and direction of Fort Frederica National Monument over the next 15 to 20 years. Alternative A would emphasize the use of archeological methods and the tangible discoveries of archeological investigations to tell the story to visitors. Active archeological investigations would be going on regularly as part of the program. There would be opportunities for visitors to interact with archeologists on site and in labs, and with other park staff in positive and meaningful ways. Under this alternative there would be additional archeological infrastructure including a lab to wash, screen, dry, number, and store artifacts in a controlled (humidity, temperature, insects) environment. There would also be office space for a curator and an archeologist as well as classrooms, additional exhibit space and storage space for equipment. Alternative B, which is the National Park Service's preferred alternative, would attempt to enable the visitor to experience some of the sights, sounds, smells, and other sensory impressions of daily life in the Fort Frederica colonial military settlement on Saint Simons Island, Georgia. Although archeological field investigations would be possible in this alternative to provide information on landscape elements and other features of the settlement, there would be no construction of additional labs or other facilities as in Alternative A. There would be more emphasis on re-establishing a visual impression of the colonial Frederica scene by using suitable methods such as appropriate trees, shrubs, ground covers and other fitting and historically accurate landscape elements. Also under this alternative, when the existing visitor center and administrative complex becomes functionally obsolete, the National Monument would seek authority and funding to demolish it and clear the site and build a new visitor center in a currently developed or previously disturbed area that is not visible from the historic town site. Administrative offices would be relocated to renovated park residences. The area formerly occupied by the visitor center and parking area would be replanted with native trees and shrubs and allowed to return to a more natural forested condition. Finally, Alternative B provides for thepossibility of constructing a dock on the Frederica River to permit tour boats and water taxis to bring visitors to the site in the same manner that the original Frederica settlers arrived. Alternative C would add additional interpretive themes to the story of colonial Frederica to place the monument site in the broader context of coastal sea island history. These themes would include pre-European, post-contact, plantation, and other historical periods associated with the Frederica site. Some on-site archeology would be necessary to reveal information necessary to interpret these other historical periods. The primary focus would remain the Fort Frederica settlement period, but the expanded number of stories would require an expansion of the visitor center to accommodate additional exhibits and programs. Alternative D is the no-action alternative, which would continue current management practices and policies into the future. Current interpretive programs include an aging 25-minute visitor center film, ranger-led tours, living history demonstrations, trade and craft demonstrations, military encampments and the annual Frederica Festival held the first weekend in March. Current resource management activities include riverbank stabilization, monitoring and maintenance of historic structures and earthworks, hazardous tree management and management of the National Monument's museum collection.