Yakima Training Center

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The Saddle Mountains on the Yakima Training Center as seen from the John Wayne Pioneer Trai]. Photo looking east southeasterly at Boylston tunnel.
The Saddle Mountains on the Yakima Training Center as seen from the John Wayne Pioneer Trai]. Photo looking east southeasterly at Boylston tunnel.
Rail cut on the Yakima Training Center in the eastern end of the Iron Horse State Park portion of the John Wayne Pioneer Trail as it nears the Columbia River south of Vantage
Rail cut on the Yakima Training Center in the eastern end of the Iron Horse State Park portion of the John Wayne Pioneer Trail as it nears the Columbia River south of Vantage

The Yakima Training Center is a United States Army training center (Army maneuver training and live fire area) located in south central Washington state. It is bounded on the west by Interstate 82, on the south by the city of Yakima, on the north by the city of Ellensburg and Interstate 90, and on the east by the Columbia River. It comprises 327,000 acres (132,332 hectares) of land, most of which consists of shrub-steppe, making it one of the largest remaining areas of shrub-steppe habitat remaining in Washington state. The terrain is undulating and dominated by three east-west parallel ridges, the Saddle Mountains, Manastash Ridge, and Umtanum Ridge anticlines, which are part of the Yakima Fold Belt near the western edge of the Columbia River Plateau. As is common for shrub-steppe, vegetation consists of sagebrush, bitter brush, and bunch grass.[1][2]

Fort Lewis uses the facility for maneuver and live fire training. Vagabond Army Airfield is located on the Yakima Training Center.

[edit] Ancillary functions

In additon to its role as a training facility, the Yakima facility has been asserted to play a major role in ECHELON, the global surveillance network operated by the National Security Agency.[3][4]

[edit] Public access

The John Wayne Pioneer Trail crosses the Yakima Training Center on the former roadbed of the Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad, which traverses 300 miles across two-thirds of Washington from the western slopes of the Cascade Mountains to the Idaho border. The railroad right-of-way was acquired by Washington state and is used as a non-motorized recreational trail. The 20-mile segment east from Kittitas to the Columbia River just south of Vantage has been developed and is managed as the Iron Horse State Park as it crosses the Yakima Training Center.[5]

[edit] References

  1. ^ | globalsecurity.org article on Yakima Training Center
  2. ^ Army Site
  3. ^ Bamford, James (1982). The Puzzle Palace: A Report on America's Most Secret Agency.. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. ISBN 0-395-31286-8. 
  4. ^ Schmid, Gerhard (2001-07-11). On the existence of a global system for the interception of private and commercial communications (ECHELON interception system) - Temporary Committee on the ECHELON Interception System, (2001/2098(INI)) (pdf - 194 pages) (English). European Parliament: Temporary Committee on the ECHELON Interception System. Retrieved on 2008-03-27.
  5. ^ Long-Distance Trails of the Washington State Parks System