The endstates describe the Park as it might be 25 years from now in 2037.  They are purposefully extreme and attempt to capture particular points of view about what should happen to the Park or what might happen if the best decisions are not made.  The real future of the Adirondack Park will be some combination of these and, indeed, in our workshops we lead people to the point of thinking about how they might be used to create a more realistic composite endstate or perhaps a series of endstates that we go through over time.

As a way of getting people to engage with the endstates, we ask them to rank order them on two measures:

• Desirability:  Which is the one you (personally) want to happen?
• Attainability:  Which is the one that we could make happen most easily, given today’s conditions?

After reading the endstates, you can try the ranking as shown below.  So, here are the six endstates:

• 2037 A: Wild Park
• 2037 B: A Usable Park
• 2037 C: The Sustainable Life
• 2037 D: Adirondack County
• 2037 E: Post “Big Government” Solutions
• 2037 F: The Adirondack State Forest

We have also prepared a synopsis of the endstates, which you can download here.

Endstate Ranking

After you have read the six endstates, you can try to rank order them on the two criteria of Desirability and Attainability.  Use the Endstate letters (A, B, C, D, E, F) and indicate which one is most desirable by putting it first in the list, then indicate the second most desirable by putting it second, and so on until you have listed all six endstates, with the last one being the least desirable in your opinion.  Then do the same for Attainability.  Here is a sample:

Desirable:  C, D, B, A, E, F   (C is most desirable and F is least)

Attainable: E, F, B, C, A, D    (E is most attainable and D is least)

If you wish, you can mail your rankings to us at:   adkfutures@gmail.com