The Fire Island road that wasn't: Bob Moses, the wilderness movement, and a new National Seashore

The United States Congress established Fire Island, a narrow sandbar that parallels Long Island's south coast, as a National Seashore in 1964. The National Park Service, however, was not the only agency with detailed plans for Fire Island in the mid-twentieth century. New York State and Robert Moses wanted to build a four-lane highway atop the island's dunes, the Army Corps of Engineers held Congressionally-approved plans to minimize erosion damage, and locals--both year-round and summer residents--wanted to keep the area quiet and far from the clamor of New York City.;Despite the varying plans for the island, Fire Island ultimately became a National Seashore because Robert Moses resurrected his decades-old plan for a Fire Island road at the height the national wilderness movement and its roadless rhetoric. Fire Island locals were able to successfully advocate for a National Seashore and also keep their homes, unlike many nineteenth century locals in nature preserves, because of their wealth and strong political voice. The political connections of Fire Islanders and the strength of the wilderness movement in 1962 provided locals a strong ally in their quest to keep Fire Island roadless: the federal government. The Kennedy administration and its Secretary of the Interior Stewart Udall actively pushed a land conservation policy that promoted both wilderness and recreation near major urban areas, and Fire Island had both.