Expan­si­on of Nor­dens­ki­öld Land natio­nal park

Nor­dens­ki­öld Land Natio­nal­park includes the sou­thern part of Nor­dens­ki­öld Land, in other words the north coast of Bell­sund. This natio­nal park is now under review and the plan is to make it much lar­ger. The idea is to include almost all of Van Mijenfjord and lar­ge parts of Van Keu­len­fjord. The south side of Van Keu­len­fjord are alre­a­dy part of the South Spits­ber­gen natio­nal park. The result would hence be that all of Spits­ber­gen south of Nor­dens­ki­öld Land, from Van Mijenfjord to Sør­kapp, would have pro­tec­tion sta­tus as natio­nal park.

Blue: the sche­du­led expan­si­on of Nor­dens­ki­öld Land natio­nal park.
Map © Sys­sel­man­nen på Sval­bard.

Public hea­ring

The pro­cess is curr­ent­ly in the stage of public hea­ring. The public is encou­ra­ged to give input to the Sys­sel­man­nen.

Rest­ric­tions for snow mobi­les, new bird sanc­tua­ries

A lar­ger Nor­dens­ki­öld Land natio­nal park is likely to invol­ve seve­ral rest­ric­tions for public traf­fic, inclu­ding rest­ric­tions for moto­ri­zed traf­fic (snow mobi­les) on the fjord ice of Van Mijenfjor­den. This is main­ly tar­ge­tet against snow mobi­le traf­fic to Rin­ders­buk­ta and Akseløya. In addi­ti­on, 3 new bird sanc­tua­ries are plan­ned in loca­ti­ons that have high con­cen­tra­ti­ons of res­t­ing and bree­ding birds, main­ly com­mon eider ducks, bar­na­cle geese and pink-foo­ted geese. The loca­ti­ons curr­ent­ly in ques­ti­on are Maria­hol­men (near Akseløya), Ehol­men (near Fors­bla­dod­den) and Mid­ter­huks­let­ta.

The expan­si­on of the Nor­dens­ki­öld Land natio­nal park may bring traf­fic rest­ric­tions in seve­ral new bird sanc­tua­ries, incu­ding Mid­ter­huks­let­ta.

Parts of the for­mer sett­le­ment of Sveagru­va, which is lar­ge­ly being remo­ved the­se days, are curr­ent­ly not included in the enlar­ged natio­nal park.

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