Burning Man promotes

leave no trace:

Burning Man is a Leave No Trace Event, and we seek not only to minimize our impact in the desert but also to understand our impact beyond its boundaries. The links to the right will guide you through preparing for your Burning Man experience, and will introduce some groups who are dedicated to addressing environmental issues in Black Rock City and beyond.

and they have an Environmental Statement that talks about using non-fossil fuels. Their statement does not address how Burning Man affects the local environment though.

Burning Man has a huge problem:

We are destroying the desert

The problem is that 49,599 attendees stir up a lot of dust, which gets blown around the desert and is
changing the Black Rock Desert from one of the World’s flattest places, suitable for the 1997 ThrustSSC land speed record, to a dune field.

Personal Observations with some citeable sources

I’ve been going to the Black Rock Desert since 1990. During the first few years, if the desert was dry, then it was flat and hard. Land sailing was easy, it was possible to bicycle with your eyes closed.

The first time I saw large incidental dunes was just after the 1997 ThrustSSC broke the sound barrier. These dunes were located near the 3 mile entrance, where the temporary buildings to support both land speed record efforts. The dunes were probably 6″ high and maybe 12 feet long.

Burning Man is big on Leave No Trace, yet even today,

scars from _two_ of the
late 90’s burns near the 3 mile entrance persist in Google Maps?
Why is that? Yahoo maps has these two scars as well.

In April, 2000, the BLM sent email (Bilbo2000) about the “playa serpents”.

The source material for the dunes is most likely Burning Man (Young2000).

The dust storms at Burning Man have been getting worse over the
years.

In addition, severe dust storms have been happening earlier
and earlier during the week of Burning Man. In 2000, a severe dust
storm occurred on Sunday, after the burn. In 2007, the worst dust
storm was on Wednesday during Burning Man. In 2008, there was a severe
dust storm on Monday. These storms occur when wind picks up sand
disturbed by users of the playa. The storms have been occurring earlier
because the desert has not had time to recover, and the number of people
has increased.

The dust from Burning Man is affecting areas outside of the Burning Man site.

In October, 2006 and October 2007, I was camped downwind of the
Burning Man site. The amount of dust blowing from the site was immense.
Each year, there was a wall of dust blowing downwind, where at one location, the
air would be fairly clear, yet walking 50 feet would put one inside a
maelstrom of dust. In past years, Burning Man has dragged the desert
with chains in an effort to smooth over the site. All this does is effectively
plow up the desert and allow wind to move the dust and sand away from
the site. This means that the site looks ok, but north and south of the
site is a labyrinth of dunes.

Desert
Pavement is a type of desert surface that consists of pebbles that
are tightly packed together, possibly because the sand separating the
pebbles has been removed. In the northeast arm of the Black Rock
Desert, there is fresh sand being deposited on desert pavement. The sad
thing is that because of the degree of desert varnish on the desert pavement, the desert pavement
appears quite old, possibly hundreds or even thousands of years old.

The dunes have become worse and worse. At Burning Man 2008, a
line of dunes ran East-West just south of the 3:00 road. The dunes
were large enough that art cars had to detour. Bicycling was very
difficult, cyclists were limited to traveling on the tire tracks of
cars. In effect, Burning Man has already lost use of the desert,
bicyclists are required to follow roads.

The Burning Man organization tries quite hard to reduce the impact
of the event. This problem is caused by the amount of dust disturbed
by the attendees. The best solution would be for Burning Man to buy
land elsewhere and hold the event there. The perfect solution would
be land from an open-pit mine that needed reclaiming.

Timeline of Serpent Playas

August, 1968. Michael Heizer comes to the Black Rock Desert
and creates “Dissipate”. See http://www.kunst.uni-stuttgart.de/seminar/complex_one/pages/dissi.html for a photo. Note that there are no dunes.
See also “After ‘Dissipate'” for other resources.

October, 1970: Article by James T. Neal includes a photo
of dune on the playa. The reference is from the June 2006 BLM Environmental Assesment below.

Neal, James T., 1970. Playa Surface Features as Indicators of Environment. Proc. 1970 Playa Lake Symposium. Texas Tech Univ. HYPERLINK “http://www.lib.ttu.edu/playa/ text/playa9.htm”

What’s interesting here is that archive.org
shows http://www.lib.ttu.edu as being removed on April 16, 2006, or possibly well before the Burning Man EA below was published in July, 2006 Happily, archive.org does have a cache of the site at
http://web.archive.org/web/20031003024901/http://www.lib.ttu.edu/playa/text/playa9.htm:

Aeolian sand deposits along the eastern shore of Rogers Lake, California (Fig. 24), typify problems of demarcating the playa boundary at numerous localities in many deserts. Erosional modification of the original pattern and subsequent deposition have rendered the boundary obscure. At Rogers Lake the sand has mantled the lacustrine deposits, and cementation has largely stabilized the dune topography, whereas it may be actively migrating elsewhere. Material identification can be improved through the complemental use of thermal infrared imagery and through the use of low-sun-angle photography to enhance shadows. The problems inherent in the photographic discrimination of blanket sand deposits are portrayed in Figure 25 where slight relief and similar reflectance levels create a difficult situation.

and

Figure 25: Veneer of sand ripples, Black Rock Desert, Nevada. Sand is moist (and thus dark) bur normally blends in with lacustrine playa sediments. (135 K)

Figure 25 can be found at
http://web.archive.org/web/20031003024901/http://www.lib.ttu.edu/playa/text/fig/fig_9-25.jpg

The Dunes are much worse now. It is great that there is a picture from 1970 showing that this is not a new process. What is different is that there
are many more dunes that are much larger. See
http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=Burning+Man+dunes&m=text

April 17, 2000 BLM Email

From Mike_Bilbo@nv.blm.gov Mon Apr 17 17:58:39 2000
Received: by nvgate.nv.blm.gov; id RAA26582; Mon, 17 Apr 2000 17:56:35 -0700 (PDT)
Received: from nv0084.nvso.nv.blm.gov(158.68.176.84) by nvgate.nv.blm.gov via smap (4.1)
id xma026226; Mon, 17 Apr 00 17:56:10 -0700
Received: by LMNV1.nv.blm.gov(Lotus SMTP MTA v4.6.5 (863.2 5-20-1999)) id 882568C5.00051717 ; Mon, 17 Apr 2000 17:55:35 -0700
X-Lotus-FromDomain: BLM
Return-Receipt-To: Mike_Bilbo@nv.blm.gov
To: Many addresses removed

Message-ID:
Date: Mon, 17 Apr 2000 17:55:30 -0700
Subject: Playa Safety Alert – Transient Dunes

Some of you will get this twice because I put several group lists together for
this alert.

New transient dunes have formed on the Black Rock Desert playa west of the
Coyote Springs vicinity (landsailor Brian Covey GPSd about a 4-mile swath
yesterday), and are a potential safety hazard. We need to get the word out to
respective publics through websites and other means. The central playa
trackways are partially covered by these dunes in certain areas and persons used
to travelling at high speed, day or night, might hit these due to low visibility
(sun angle, darkness, color blending, travel direction, mirage, etc). For those
of you who are not familiar with Coyote Springs, it is one of three mound
springs northwest of the Garrett Place (Frog Farm, Bordello Spring). It is the
area that Doug Keister has the annual golf tournament. These dunes also overlay
parts of the land speed record trackway, especially the measured mile area.

This week and weekend (4/18-23), one of our geologists, Delores Cates and
volunteer Sue McMurray, and some other persons, are going to map this
phenomenom. I have asked Sue and Chet Geyer to help with AeroPac’s
radio-controlled plane in doing low altitude aerial photo documentation. Sue
McMurray is going to spend the rest of this week documenting this feature.

Delores told me the dune graines are different than the normal clay-silt mounds
on the playa margins. This may be a function of certain weather, wind patterns,
ice/wind deposition, seasonal ripples, or maybe the more or less dry winter –
and maybe a combination of all. But there may also be other factors related to
ancient Lake Lahonton/playa weathering processes. Unfortunately, there have
been very limited studies done on Black Rock Desert playa weathering effects,
and very few studies on playas in general.

It is important to note that BLM is not in a research mode at this time. We do
have some questions about how this feature formed. But the main thing right now
is to get the feature documented, especially with reference to the visiting
public and permit events. Because the feature appears to be a natural
phenomenon, but also unique and a potential safety hazard, we will document and
GPS this feature through staff and volunteer coordination to learn its physical
extent. This information will then be passed on to you so that you can alert
your respective friends, associates, customers and the general public.

July 31, 2000: “Preliminary Analysis of Playa Bedforms of the Black Rock Desert, Washoe County, Nevada” by D. Craig Young, Jr. Private communication.

An analysis that indicates that the dunes were created by surface:

The bedforms currently present on the Black Rock playa are distinctly different from common silt dunes. They have well sorted, generally symmetrical sedimentary structures. The sorting of sand-sized grains (coalesced silt and clay particles) shows a distinct coarsening upward (i.e., particle size increases upward through the bedform with the largest particles deposited last). The bedforms rest unconformably on the playa surface; it is possible to trace the modern playa surface below individual bedforms. (There have been suggestions posted on the BLM’s Black Rock e-mail mailing list that these features may be the result of tectonic deformation, frost- or salt-heaving, or other subsurface processes. The unconformable position of the bedforms shows that they are a result of surface processes.) Individual bedforms also show the regular polygonal cracking associated with the wetting and drying of the lakebed. This suggests that the bedforms have been wet since their deposition.

The general morphology of the bedforms suggests that they were likely formed beneath the waters of the shallow playa lake that covered portions of the basin early this year. The distinct particle sorting, their general distribution, and desiccation cracking point toward a lacustrine or lakebed origin. Wind action on the surface of the shallow lake influenced the pattern of bedform deposition, and the general fluid dynamics of both wind and water acted to form -like features. The seasonal lake that forms at the end of the Quinn River system is subjected to the vagaries of seasonal storms and wind direction. The shallow lake, moved by the winds of an approaching storm, can easily shift to cover a new portion of the playa.

…

It is likely that the socio-cultural record of the Black Rock playa is most significant in explaining the presence of the playa “dunes”. The increased use of the playa resulted in a concurrent increase in sediment budget due primarily to vehicle traffic associated with large-scale events. The previous playa equilibrium was affected as the sediment budget crossed a threshold where seasonal reworking could not reestablish open playa conditions. A recent increase in sediment load in the seasonal playa lake resulted in bedform formation. The playa system is moving toward a new equilibrium associated with the new sediment budget by establishing “dunes” on the open playa.

August 24, 2000 website about playa conditions at the Burning Man airport:

There are playa serpents on both sides. The area to the southwest of the Airport Camp is filled with playa serpents. For those who don’t know, playa serpents are little dunes, lumps, bumps, curvy hillocks in the otherwise smooth and flat dry lake bed. They are numerous in areas that were smooth last year. They may all be gone next year. Don’t take the desert for granted.

BLM site: Black Rock Desert Travel Advisory (with photos) – Dated as being last updated on July 17, 2001. Archive.org has this page as first appearing on August 16, 2000

The book
“Playa Works: The Myth of the Empty”, William L. Fox, University of Nevada Press, 2002, ISBN 0874175232, 9780874175233, 220p
page 174 says:

John Bogard and his friends of Planet X landsail out here on their three-wheeled dirtboats, and the “playa serpents,” “desert snake,” or “reefs,” as the low dunes have been variously labeled are hazardous to their health, invisible as they are to anyone running at high speeds across the playa. Bogard has file a complaint with the BLM about their not doing a full-blown Environmental Impact Statement of Burning Man, believing that the event has simply gotten too large for it to be held on a fickle surface, that is, in essence, his backyard. The complaint alleges that fugitive dust from Burning Man piles up as transient dunes, but the link to cause and effect is only conjecture at this point. It’s as or more likely that the vastly increased OHV activity may have caused the dunes, or the Breedlove versus Nobel/Green competition, or that they are even the result of some undetermined natural subsurface activity. Yet another theory in the Winnemucca Field Office of the Bureau of Land Management is that they were deposited by wind-drive water from flash floods. Whateer the cause, pictures of similar features that existed temporarily in the same area were taken as early as 1970.

The photo from 1970 is likely Neal1970 above.

June 2006:
Burning Man 2006-2010 Special Recreation Permit NV-020-06-EA-11 Environmental Assessment, prepared by the BLM:

The sediments of the playa surface are subject to displacement by
winds when dry and disturbed. Winds that most commonly move thsurface materials are associated with frontal passage or thunderstorms. Wind movement of sediment particles caperiodic formation of low, transient dunes. Wind erosion is a function oparticle erodibility, surface roughness and weather conditions. Vehicle use and other disturbances on the playa alter the surface roughness. Increased roughness slows sediment particle movement across the surface, causing particles to accumulate on the leeward side of low features forming transient dunes. The dunes are temporary featuresgenerally less than a foot in height. The actions of wind and water over one or more winters lead to the removal of the dunes. These dunes have become increasingly common over the past several yeabut have been documented prior to periods of heavy human activity on the playa surface (Neal 1970).

The (Neal 1970) reference is discussed above.

AERO-PAC Playa Serpents. Archive.org first cached this page on 9/27/2006. The page
has pictures of a two incidental dunes.

Ian Kluft’s Ae Pictures from CSXT’s Space Shot 2002 – September 17-19, 2002. Note that there are more serpents

Near the CSXT cleanup area, we took this picture of the “serpent garden” which many of us had noticed over the previous days in the Burning Man cleanup zone. There were more “playa serpents” (mini dunes) here than any of us had ever seen in one place before. This seemed like compelling evidence in favor of the local residents’ theory that playa serpent formation is radically accelerated by massive disruptions of the playa surface by the 40,000-person party at Burning Man.

archive.org April, 2007 copy of http://www.stopburningman.org says:

A phenomenon called “playa serpents” is becoming increasingly common on the playa. These playa serpents are low-lying dunes that form due to wind action. OPINION: Some people theorize that they are caused by disturbance of heavier sediments on the surface of the playa than normally are disturbed by wind alone, resulting in a less stable surface. This disturbance is probably more likely to happen with 30,000 people and their cars out on the playa. In 1997, the land speed record was set at Black Rock Desert. Since then, the playa serpents have become much more numerous, and such a feat may not be possible at Black Rock anymore, since simply driving a car out there can be difficult. FACT: Dave Cooper, NCA Manager, has recognized that not enough is known about playa serpents. “BLM has proposed a study of “playa dynamics” that would include an examination of small, mysterious sand dunes observed near the festival site in recent years.” (RGJ article)

August 27, 2007 article on the Reno Gazette Journal website:

The condition of the Black Rock Desert varies each year, depending on
moisture levels, Cooper said. Drought has caused some ripples or bumps
in the sand, known as “playa serpents”

“Does Burning Man change the state of the playa? No,” he said.
“If it did, it would be a small amount

“There are 110 miles of vehicle routes that are entrenched that drivers follow
out here. Those could be permanent scars, but they have nothing to do
with Burning Man.”
Cooper said environmental impacts of Burning Man are miniscule and
that s hardly one of the largest environmental

Burning Man is in a fenced-off area of almost 5 square miles. The Black Rock Desert-High Rock Canyon Emigrant Trails National Conservation Area is 815,000 square miles and is neighbored by another 375,000 of wilderness outside the National Conservation Area, according to BLM.Man. amount.

Cooper is quoted as being “Sparks resident James Cooper”. I’m not sure
if he is any more qualified to speak about the surface than I am. At least
I have some citable references.

Other events that occur on the Black Rock Desert have at most 200 people.
This year. Burning Man at almost 50,000 people, is 250 times that.

Burning Man promotes

leave no trace:

Burning Man is a Leave No Trace Event, and we seek not only to minimize our impact in the desert but also to understand our impact beyond its boundaries. The links to the right will guide you through preparing for your Burning Man experience, and will introduce some groups who are dedicated to addressing environmental issues in Black Rock City and beyond.

and they have an Environmental Statement that talks about using non-fossil fuels. Their statement does not address how Burning Man affects the local environment though.

Burning Man has a huge problem:

We are destroying the desert

The problem is that 49,599 attendees stir up a lot of dust, which gets blown around the desert and is
changing the Black Rock Desert from one of the World’s flattest places, suitable for the 1997 ThrustSSC land speed record, to a dune field.

Personal Observations with some citeable sources

I’ve been going to the Black Rock Desert since 1990. During the first few years, if the desert was dry, then it was flat and hard. Land sailing was easy, it was possible to bicycle with your eyes closed.

The first time I saw large incidental dunes was just after the 1997 ThrustSSC broke the sound barrier. These dunes were located near the 3 mile entrance, where the temporary buildings to support both land speed record efforts. The dunes were probably 6″ high and maybe 12 feet long.

Burning Man is big on Leave No Trace, yet even today,

scars from _two_ of the
late 90’s burns near the 3 mile entrance persist in Google Maps?
Why is that? Yahoo maps has these two scars as well.

In April, 2000, the BLM sent email (Bilbo2000) about the “playa serpents”.

The source material for the dunes is most likely Burning Man (Young2000).

The dust storms at Burning Man have been getting worse over the
years.

In addition, severe dust storms have been happening earlier
and earlier during the week of Burning Man. In 2000, a severe dust
storm occurred on Sunday, after the burn. In 2007, the worst dust
storm was on Wednesday during Burning Man. In 2008, there was a severe
dust storm on Monday. These storms occur when wind picks up sand
disturbed by users of the playa. The storms have been occurring earlier
because the desert has not had time to recover, and the number of people
has increased.

The dust from Burning Man is affecting areas outside of the Burning Man site.

In October, 2006 and October 2007, I was camped downwind of the
Burning Man site. The amount of dust blowing from the site was immense.
Each year, there was a wall of dust blowing downwind, where at one location, the
air would be fairly clear, yet walking 50 feet would put one inside a
maelstrom of dust. In past years, Burning Man has dragged the desert
with chains in an effort to smooth over the site. All this does is effectively
plow up the desert and allow wind to move the dust and sand away from
the site. This means that the site looks ok, but north and south of the
site is a labyrinth of dunes.

Desert
Pavement is a type of desert surface that consists of pebbles that
are tightly packed together, possibly because the sand separating the
pebbles has been removed. In the northeast arm of the Black Rock
Desert, there is fresh sand being deposited on desert pavement. The sad
thing is that because of the degree of desert varnish on the desert pavement, the desert pavement
appears quite old, possibly hundreds or even thousands of years old.

The dunes have become worse and worse. At Burning Man 2008, a
line of dunes ran East-West just south of the 3:00 road. The dunes
were large enough that art cars had to detour. Bicycling was very
difficult, cyclists were limited to traveling on the tire tracks of
cars. In effect, Burning Man has already lost use of the desert,
bicyclists are required to follow roads.

The Burning Man organization tries quite hard to reduce the impact
of the event. This problem is caused by the amount of dust disturbed
by the attendees. The best solution would be for Burning Man to buy
land elsewhere and hold the event there. The perfect solution would
be land from an open-pit mine that needed reclaiming.

Timeline of Serpent Playas

August, 1968. Michael Heizer comes to the Black Rock Desert
and creates “Dissipate”. See http://www.kunst.uni-stuttgart.de/seminar/complex_one/pages/dissi.html for a photo. Note that there are no dunes.
See also “After ‘Dissipate'” for other resources.

October, 1970: Article by James T. Neal includes a photo
of dune on the playa. The reference is from the June 2006 BLM Environmental Assesment below.

Neal, James T., 1970. Playa Surface Features as Indicators of Environment. Proc. 1970 Playa Lake Symposium. Texas Tech Univ. HYPERLINK “http://www.lib.ttu.edu/playa/ text/playa9.htm”

What’s interesting here is that archive.org
shows http://www.lib.ttu.edu as being removed on April 16, 2006, or possibly well before the Burning Man EA below was published in July, 2006 Happily, archive.org does have a cache of the site at
http://web.archive.org/web/20031003024901/http://www.lib.ttu.edu/playa/text/playa9.htm:

Aeolian sand deposits along the eastern shore of Rogers Lake, California (Fig. 24), typify problems of demarcating the playa boundary at numerous localities in many deserts. Erosional modification of the original pattern and subsequent deposition have rendered the boundary obscure. At Rogers Lake the sand has mantled the lacustrine deposits, and cementation has largely stabilized the dune topography, whereas it may be actively migrating elsewhere. Material identification can be improved through the complemental use of thermal infrared imagery and through the use of low-sun-angle photography to enhance shadows. The problems inherent in the photographic discrimination of blanket sand deposits are portrayed in Figure 25 where slight relief and similar reflectance levels create a difficult situation.

and

Figure 25: Veneer of sand ripples, Black Rock Desert, Nevada. Sand is moist (and thus dark) bur normally blends in with lacustrine playa sediments. (135 K)

Figure 25 can be found at
http://web.archive.org/web/20031003024901/http://www.lib.ttu.edu/playa/text/fig/fig_9-25.jpg

The Dunes are much worse now. It is great that there is a picture from 1970 showing that this is not a new process. What is different is that there
are many more dunes that are much larger. See
http://www.flickr.com/search/?q=Burning+Man+dunes&m=text

April 17, 2000 BLM Email

From Mike_Bilbo@nv.blm.gov Mon Apr 17 17:58:39 2000
Received: by nvgate.nv.blm.gov; id RAA26582; Mon, 17 Apr 2000 17:56:35 -0700 (PDT)
Received: from nv0084.nvso.nv.blm.gov(158.68.176.84) by nvgate.nv.blm.gov via smap (4.1)
id xma026226; Mon, 17 Apr 00 17:56:10 -0700
Received: by LMNV1.nv.blm.gov(Lotus SMTP MTA v4.6.5 (863.2 5-20-1999)) id 882568C5.00051717 ; Mon, 17 Apr 2000 17:55:35 -0700
X-Lotus-FromDomain: BLM
Return-Receipt-To: Mike_Bilbo@nv.blm.gov
To: Many addresses removed

Message-ID:
Date: Mon, 17 Apr 2000 17:55:30 -0700
Subject: Playa Safety Alert – Transient Dunes

Some of you will get this twice because I put several group lists together for
this alert.

New transient dunes have formed on the Black Rock Desert playa west of the
Coyote Springs vicinity (landsailor Brian Covey GPSd about a 4-mile swath
yesterday), and are a potential safety hazard. We need to get the word out to
respective publics through websites and other means. The central playa
trackways are partially covered by these dunes in certain areas and persons used
to travelling at high speed, day or night, might hit these due to low visibility
(sun angle, darkness, color blending, travel direction, mirage, etc). For those
of you who are not familiar with Coyote Springs, it is one of three mound
springs northwest of the Garrett Place (Frog Farm, Bordello Spring). It is the
area that Doug Keister has the annual golf tournament. These dunes also overlay
parts of the land speed record trackway, especially the measured mile area.

This week and weekend (4/18-23), one of our geologists, Delores Cates and
volunteer Sue McMurray, and some other persons, are going to map this
phenomenom. I have asked Sue and Chet Geyer to help with AeroPac’s
radio-controlled plane in doing low altitude aerial photo documentation. Sue
McMurray is going to spend the rest of this week documenting this feature.

Delores told me the dune graines are different than the normal clay-silt mounds
on the playa margins. This may be a function of certain weather, wind patterns,
ice/wind deposition, seasonal ripples, or maybe the more or less dry winter –
and maybe a combination of all. But there may also be other factors related to
ancient Lake Lahonton/playa weathering processes. Unfortunately, there have
been very limited studies done on Black Rock Desert playa weathering effects,
and very few studies on playas in general.

It is important to note that BLM is not in a research mode at this time. We do
have some questions about how this feature formed. But the main thing right now
is to get the feature documented, especially with reference to the visiting
public and permit events. Because the feature appears to be a natural
phenomenon, but also unique and a potential safety hazard, we will document and
GPS this feature through staff and volunteer coordination to learn its physical
extent. This information will then be passed on to you so that you can alert
your respective friends, associates, customers and the general public.

July 31, 2000: “Preliminary Analysis of Playa Bedforms of the Black Rock Desert, Washoe County, Nevada” by D. Craig Young, Jr. Private communication.

An analysis that indicates that the dunes were created by surface:

The bedforms currently present on the Black Rock playa are distinctly different from common silt dunes. They have well sorted, generally symmetrical sedimentary structures. The sorting of sand-sized grains (coalesced silt and clay particles) shows a distinct coarsening upward (i.e., particle size increases upward through the bedform with the largest particles deposited last). The bedforms rest unconformably on the playa surface; it is possible to trace the modern playa surface below individual bedforms. (There have been suggestions posted on the BLM’s Black Rock e-mail mailing list that these features may be the result of tectonic deformation, frost- or salt-heaving, or other subsurface processes. The unconformable position of the bedforms shows that they are a result of surface processes.) Individual bedforms also show the regular polygonal cracking associated with the wetting and drying of the lakebed. This suggests that the bedforms have been wet since their deposition.

The general morphology of the bedforms suggests that they were likely formed beneath the waters of the shallow playa lake that covered portions of the basin early this year. The distinct particle sorting, their general distribution, and desiccation cracking point toward a lacustrine or lakebed origin. Wind action on the surface of the shallow lake influenced the pattern of bedform deposition, and the general fluid dynamics of both wind and water acted to form -like features. The seasonal lake that forms at the end of the Quinn River system is subjected to the vagaries of seasonal storms and wind direction. The shallow lake, moved by the winds of an approaching storm, can easily shift to cover a new portion of the playa.

…

It is likely that the socio-cultural record of the Black Rock playa is most significant in explaining the presence of the playa “dunes”. The increased use of the playa resulted in a concurrent increase in sediment budget due primarily to vehicle traffic associated with large-scale events. The previous playa equilibrium was affected as the sediment budget crossed a threshold where seasonal reworking could not reestablish open playa conditions. A recent increase in sediment load in the seasonal playa lake resulted in bedform formation. The playa system is moving toward a new equilibrium associated with the new sediment budget by establishing “dunes” on the open playa.

August 24, 2000 website about playa conditions at the Burning Man airport:

There are playa serpents on both sides. The area to the southwest of the Airport Camp is filled with playa serpents. For those who don’t know, playa serpents are little dunes, lumps, bumps, curvy hillocks in the otherwise smooth and flat dry lake bed. They are numerous in areas that were smooth last year. They may all be gone next year. Don’t take the desert for granted.

BLM site: Black Rock Desert Travel Advisory (with photos) – Dated as being last updated on July 17, 2001. Archive.org has this page as first appearing on August 16, 2000

The book
“Playa Works: The Myth of the Empty”, William L. Fox, University of Nevada Press, 2002, ISBN 0874175232, 9780874175233, 220p
page 174 says:

John Bogard and his friends of Planet X landsail out here on their three-wheeled dirtboats, and the “playa serpents,” “desert snake,” or “reefs,” as the low dunes have been variously labeled are hazardous to their health, invisible as they are to anyone running at high speeds across the playa. Bogard has file a complaint with the BLM about their not doing a full-blown Environmental Impact Statement of Burning Man, believing that the event has simply gotten too large for it to be held on a fickle surface, that is, in essence, his backyard. The complaint alleges that fugitive dust from Burning Man piles up as transient dunes, but the link to cause and effect is only conjecture at this point. It’s as or more likely that the vastly increased OHV activity may have caused the dunes, or the Breedlove versus Nobel/Green competition, or that they are even the result of some undetermined natural subsurface activity. Yet another theory in the Winnemucca Field Office of the Bureau of Land Management is that they were deposited by wind-drive water from flash floods. Whateer the cause, pictures of similar features that existed temporarily in the same area were taken as early as 1970.

The photo from 1970 is likely Neal1970 above.

June 2006:
Burning Man 2006-2010 Special Recreation Permit NV-020-06-EA-11 Environmental Assessment, prepared by the BLM:

The sediments of the playa surface are subject to displacement by
winds when dry and disturbed. Winds that most commonly move thsurface materials are associated with frontal passage or thunderstorms. Wind movement of sediment particles caperiodic formation of low, transient dunes. Wind erosion is a function oparticle erodibility, surface roughness and weather conditions. Vehicle use and other disturbances on the playa alter the surface roughness. Increased roughness slows sediment particle movement across the surface, causing particles to accumulate on the leeward side of low features forming transient dunes. The dunes are temporary featuresgenerally less than a foot in height. The actions of wind and water over one or more winters lead to the removal of the dunes. These dunes have become increasingly common over the past several yeabut have been documented prior to periods of heavy human activity on the playa surface (Neal 1970).

The (Neal 1970) reference is discussed above.

AERO-PAC Playa Serpents. Archive.org first cached this page on 9/27/2006. The page
has pictures of a two incidental dunes.

Ian Kluft’s Ae Pictures from CSXT’s Space Shot 2002 – September 17-19, 2002. Note that there are more serpents

Near the CSXT cleanup area, we took this picture of the “serpent garden” which many of us had noticed over the previous days in the Burning Man cleanup zone. There were more “playa serpents” (mini dunes) here than any of us had ever seen in one place before. This seemed like compelling evidence in favor of the local residents’ theory that playa serpent formation is radically accelerated by massive disruptions of the playa surface by the 40,000-person party at Burning Man.

archive.org April, 2007 copy of http://www.stopburningman.org says:

A phenomenon called “playa serpents” is becoming increasingly common on the playa. These playa serpents are low-lying dunes that form due to wind action. OPINION: Some people theorize that they are caused by disturbance of heavier sediments on the surface of the playa than normally are disturbed by wind alone, resulting in a less stable surface. This disturbance is probably more likely to happen with 30,000 people and their cars out on the playa. In 1997, the land speed record was set at Black Rock Desert. Since then, the playa serpents have become much more numerous, and such a feat may not be possible at Black Rock anymore, since simply driving a car out there can be difficult. FACT: Dave Cooper, NCA Manager, has recognized that not enough is known about playa serpents. “BLM has proposed a study of “playa dynamics” that would include an examination of small, mysterious sand dunes observed near the festival site in recent years.” (RGJ article)

August 27, 2007 article on the Reno Gazette Journal website:

The condition of the Black Rock Desert varies each year, depending on
moisture levels, Cooper said. Drought has caused some ripples or bumps
in the sand, known as “playa serpents”

“Does Burning Man change the state of the playa? No,” he said.
“If it did, it would be a small amount

“There are 110 miles of vehicle routes that are entrenched that drivers follow
out here. Those could be permanent scars, but they have nothing to do
with Burning Man.”
Cooper said environmental impacts of Burning Man are miniscule and
that s hardly one of the largest environmental

Burning Man is in a fenced-off area of almost 5 square miles. The Black Rock Desert-High Rock Canyon Emigrant Trails National Conservation Area is 815,000 square miles and is neighbored by another 375,000 of wilderness outside the National Conservation Area, according to BLM.Man. amount.

The Cooper being quoted is probably Dave Cooper, “manager of Black Rock Desert-High Rock Canyon Emigrant Trails National Conservation Area.”

Other events that occur on the Black Rock Desert have at most 200 people.
This year. Burning Man at almost 50,000 people, is 250 times that.