Speaking as a builder, if you start something, you must have a vision of the thing which arises from your instinct about preserving and enhancing what is there - Christopher Alexander To be a carpenter or a builder or a home inspector, you have to have that kind of visual brain where you can sort of imagine something taken apart - Nick Petrie Look at kids playing with blocks. I think it's in everyone's DNA to want to be a builder - Dan Phillips You can design and create, and build the most wonderful place in the world. But it takes people to make the dream a reality - Walt Disney Good buildings come from good people, and all problems are solved by good design. - Stephen Gardiner Either a building is part of a place or it

How parks receive the IDA's Dark-Sky Certification

Most people don't realize that when they look up into the sky at night, they only see part of the picture.

What picture? The Universe.

As civilization has advanced, so has our tendency to attempt to light up every corner of the world.

There are a number of reasons why this is important.

However, there is one very negative side effect - light pollution.

When most people peer up into the night sky, they are not able to view the true sky as earlier inhabitants of the planet were able to do.

If you can find a place far away from the light, the view of a dark sky is spectacular.

You not only see prominent planets and stars in the foreground, you soon realize there is a mosaic of a gazillion points of light behind them that make up our incredible and infinite universe.

The stars and the expanse never ends.

Constellations pop out everywhere.

The big shocker

Grand Canyon National Park at sunset. (Photo from National Park Service)

America has an incredible array of parks, monuments, preserves, forts, caves, pueblos, battlefields, and missile sites all managed by our National Park Service.

Here are a few interesting facts about those parks.

Most popular, biggest and deepest parks Yellowstone National Park is not only America's first national park, it is considered the First National Park in the WORLD. This spectacular setting was established in 1872 by Congress. In 1920, there were 1 million visitors to our national parks. In 2016, there was a record-setting 331 million visitors. In 2017, it was reported that 61 of 385 reporting parks set NEW visitation records.

National parks in America are more popular than ever. In 2017, more than 331 million people visited the 379 national parks in the US, according to the National Park Service, just 90,000 short of the record set in 2016. Here are the 20 of the top national parks in the country. Please share these popular destinations with your friends (hit the share buttons at the bottom of page).

Most popular national parks include several in Utah

America has an incredible variety of landscapes in its many national parks, ranging from bursting geysers to gigantic canyons or towering forests.

Be sure to include Utah on the list of places to visit because

More towns are implementing Adopt-A-Park programs to keep their parks clean and foster more involvement by local citizen

What's one way to keep your local park clean and help out your community with just a few hours a month's efforts?

What about this idea?  Adopt-a-park.

More and more parks and recreation departments are implementing the benefits of Adopt-A-Park programs.

The concept is a simple one.

1. Allow groups to organize and focus on cleaning or "adopting" one park or a section of a park in town.

2. Provide them with some simple materials - gloves, trash bags, rakes, trash receptacles, etc.

3. Give them some direction, eg, "Please focus on cleaning up this area over here. We've had quite a few birthday parties recently and there is trash strewn a