America has a 64th national park: Arizona's 'Wonderland of Rocks' joins the list

Chiricahua National Monument in southeastern Arizona — 12,000 acres of towering stone spires formed by an ancient volcanic eruption, nicknamed the 'Wonderland of Rocks' — has been redesignated as Chiricahua National Park, the 64th national park in the USA and the first new one in six years. Protected as a monument since 1924, the park guards part of the Chiricahua Mountains, one of the 'sky islands' where four major ecosystems meet — the Rocky Mountains, Sierra Madre, Sonoran Desert and Chihuahuan Desert — sheltering nearly 200 species of birds and thousands of years of human history. The new law also explicitly protects tribal access to traditional cultural and religious sites within the park. Secretary of the Interior Doug Burgum called Chiricahua 'one of America's most extraordinary landscapes,' saying the designation will 'shine a national spotlight on one of Arizona's hidden gems.'

SDG 15 · Life on land — Mechanism: policy reform