I attended last night's panel discussion, sponsored by Boeing and the National Park Conservaton Association, that looked at how climate change might impact future access to our national parks.

I came away from the three-hour session feeling that right now the issue is framing the questions, let alone trying to come up with solutions. The six panelists and the nearly 80 people in attendance looked at the issue of access from multiple viewpoints. Some worried about future floods physically halting access, some saw it as an issue where vehicle access should be reduced to combat climate change, and others saw it as an issue of encouraging use of the parks by different cultural groups.

When I interviewed NPCA president Tom Kienan this morning, he described last night' session as developing the table of contents for future discussions. That's a good way to look at it.

There is little doubt climate change will have an impact on park access. The questions are how much, how often and when.

But I was glad to see the conversation look at the broader aspects of access.

I'll have more on the session in a future column.