Conservation organizations have filed a lawsuit against the US government over a proposed Utah road project that would blast through canyon cliffs marked with historic inscriptions and run an oil-truck route near globally significant Native American rock art.
Under the plan, a narrow, winding dirt track in Gate Canyon would be replaced with a paved road. The construction would cut into cliffs rising about 100 feet (30 meters) and threaten at least 47 historic sites, including 19th-century carvings left by Black “Buffalo Soldiers” serving in the US Army, as well as European settlers and pioneers, according to the lawsuit against the Bureau of Land Management.
The legal complaint also says the canyon walls provide habitat for threatened wildlife, including the Mexican spotted owl.
The US Department of the Interior, which oversees the Bureau of Land Management, declined to comment, citing the ongoing litigation.
Gate Canyon branches north from Nine Mile Canyon, a Utah landscape the Bureau of Land Management has dubbed the world’s longest art gallery.
Stretching roughly 46 miles (74 kilometers), Nine Mile Canyon contains the largest concentration of Native American rock art in the United States. More than 1,000 sites feature over 10,000 images, including artwork believed to date back to prehistoric periods.
The proposed paving project is intended to create an alternate trucking corridor to the Uinta Basin oil fields. Conservationists warn that increased traffic could effectively turn Nine Mile Canyon into an oil-hauling highway, putting one of Utah’s most important cultural and scenic landscapes at risk.
The 50-page complaint, filed in the US District Court for Utah’s Central Division, accuses the BLM of moving quickly to approve the blasting and paving in April 2026 while keeping the decision-making process out of public view.
The plaintiffs, including the Center for Biological Diversity, argue that approval of the road proposed by Duchesne County violated several federal protections, among them the National Environmental Policy Act, the National Historic Preservation Act and the Endangered Species Act.
Gate Canyon lies about 100 miles (160 kilometers) southeast of Salt Lake City. Black soldiers in the US Army carved their names into its sandstone walls while helping build the existing road.
According to the conservation groups, freighters and other pioneers also left behind signatures, using axle grease to mark the canyon’s walls.
The Utah case was filed only weeks after a federal judge halted the Trump administration’s plans for a border barrier through Big Bend National Park in Texas. That ruling came as courts consider an environmental lawsuit challenging the construction.
President Donald Trump has promoted a “Drill, baby, drill” agenda aimed at increasing US oil and gas production. His administration has sought to accelerate energy permits and reduce environmental restrictions as part of a broader push for American energy dominance.