Defend Alaska's Brooks Range From Ambler Road

The Brooks Range is essential for the Alaska Native peoples who live, hunt, and fish in Northwest Alaska. It's home to the world's only remaining populations of migrating caribou, and dozens of migratory and boreal bird species, from Blackpoll Warblers to Arctic Loons.

The Ambler Road proposal puts Brooks Range and everything within it at risk. If built, this will not be a simple road, but a 211-mile industrial corridor that would threaten North America's largest protected and roadless region, as well as the food security and clean water of Alaska Native Tribes. It will cut through thousands of rivers, acres of wetlands, and migration pathways.

Now is the time for the Department of the Interior to revoke the permits for the Ambler Road. Sign our petition to send a comment today to defend Brooks Range.

Note: Audubon will submit your letter, along with your name and zip code, to the U.S. Department of the Interior as part of the official comment period, and it will become part of the public record.

Photo: Blackpoll Warbler. Kevin Sim/Audubon Photography Awards

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Dear Secretary Haaland and the Department of the Interior,

I urge you to revoke the permits for the Ambler Road.  

The proposed Ambler industrial mining road would be an irreversible blow to the Brooks Range and would open the floodgate to widespread destructive mining operations across Northwest Alaska. This proposed 211-mile, private, industrial access corridor would run through the Arctic’s critical caribou and bird habitat, salmon and sheefish spawning areas, and Gates of the Arctic National Preserve. Fifteen species of boreal birds found along the Amber Road corridor, including the Blackpoll Warbler and Olive-sided Flycatcher, already face significant decline across their ranges and would be directly impacted by the road. 

The Alaska Native villages of Kobuk, Shungnak, Ambler, Noorvik, and Kivalina sit downstream from where international mining companies hope to break ground on multiple open-pit mines. The massive mining project would threaten more than 40 communities who depend on the Western Arctic Caribou Herd, and the Kobuk and Koyukuk Rivers’ fisheries, for their food and traditional way of life.  

Local residents are clear that they want to protect their communities, defend essential lands for caribou and fish, and ensure the longevity of clean water and subsistence fisheries. 

Thank you for taking the time to continue to review the impacts of the proposed Ambler Road.  

Now we are calling on the Department of the Interior to defend the Brooks Range. Please revoke permits for the Ambler Road.