Yosemite West, California Yosemite West, California Yosemite West is an unincorporated community of resort homes located just outside the southern area of Yosemite National Park, just off Wawona Road, a continuation of State Route 41 from Fresno. It is situated south of the Chinquapin intersection of Wawona Road with Glacier Point Road at an altitude of . The elevation reported by the USGS is . The community is part of Henness Ridge, nearly above the southern banks of the Merced River and State Route 140 from Mariposa. As early as 1912 the cutting of timber in the Chinquapin area was started and logs
Yosemite Valley built in the 1880s—still operates. After the Valley became a park, the surrounding territory was still subject to logging, mining, and grazing. John Muir publicized the damage to the subalpine meadows that surround the Valley and in 1890, the government created a national park that included a much larger territory—enclosing Yosemite Valley and Mariposa Grove. As with Yellowstone, the new federal park was under U.S. Army jurisdiction until 1914. In 1906, the state ceded the Valley and Mariposa Grove to the federal government. The National Park Service, on its creation in 1916, took over Yosemite. Yosemite Valley is listed as