Federal land agencies plan to restrict off-road vehicles in West
By MARTIN GRIFFITH | Associated Press
May 5, 2005

RENO, Nev. - For decades, off-road vehicle enthusiasts have been mostly free to roam federal forests and rangelands at will. But their freewheeling days could be numbered.

In a move expected to generate controversy, the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management are developing plans to restrict the vehicles to designated routes and areas.

Federal officials say the proposal is essential to curb environmental damage and ease conflict among users of public lands. Nationally, they cite a sevenfold increase from 1972 to 2000 in the number of off-roaders to 36 million.

"The days of blazing new trails are coming to an end," said Leo Drumm, off-highway vehicle coordinator for the Nevada BLM. "Off-highway vehicles are a legitimate use of public land, but there has to be some controls."

Nowhere would the proposed changes have a bigger effect than Nevada and its wide-open spaces.

The federal government controls 87 percent of the state, and Nevada is home to the largest national forest outside Alaska: the 6.3-million-acre Humboldt-Toiyabe.

While the vast majority of Nevada's backcountry is currently unrestricted to off-roaders, federal land managers have begun the process to ban travel off designated routes and areas.

And while the changes might be most dramatic in Nevada, similar efforts to address off-road travel are under way across the West.

"We're all recognizing at the same time the need to work on this issue," said Bob Vaught, supervisor of the Humboldt-Toiyabe. "There's widespread agreement that we need to do a better job of managing off-highway vehicle use."

Even though a Forest Service national off-road policy awaits final action nearly a year after it was unveiled, individual national forests are being encouraged to address the issue because of soaring off-road use.

Federal land managers are taking a cue from Forest Service chief Dale Bosworth, who identified unmanaged recreation as one of the four biggest threats to national forests.

BLM Director Kathleen Clarke shares Bosworth's concerns.

Environmental and motorized recreation groups praise federal officials for confronting the issue, but they say a battle looms over which roads and trails to close and keep open.

Conservationists said they're concerned not enough roads will be closed to protect wildlife and habitat.

"We need to encourage them to act in a way that will result in real on-the-ground protection," said Jeremy Garncarz of the Wilderness Society's Denver office. "We're losing wildlife habitat on a daily basis because of these problems."

Most hunters welcome the push to keep off-road vehicles to designated routes and areas, said Stan Rauch, hunter outreach coordinator of the Washington, D.C.-based National Trails and Waters Coalition, which seeks better management of the vehicles on public land.

Traditional sportsmen have accused those who go off road to hunt using all-terrain vehicles of disturbing their hunts and punching out more new roads in remote regions across the West.

"It's a good positive development for the land and users looking for a quality experience on public land," said Rauch, a big-game hunter from Victor, Mont., and member of the National Rifle Association.

Vehicle enthusiasts will try to keep as many roads and trails open as possible, said Brian Hawthorne, public lands director of the BlueRibbon Coalition, a motorized recreation advocacy group based in Pocatello, Idaho.

"(Environmentalists) are spending millions of dollars to close public land to public uses," Hawthorne said. "That's where the controversy is generated. What we want are managed off-highway trail systems and areas that are sustainable and that we can enjoy for generations to come."

Gerald Lent of the Nevada Hunters Association said most off-roaders are responsible and are being unfairly singled out. He questions the need for restrictions.

"Out in the middle of the desert, what damage are you doing with an ATV?" Lent asked. "It doesn't hurt anything. There's so much land out there I don't know how they would harm it."

Last year, Nevada Wildlife Commission Chairman Tommy Ford got a taste of the intense feelings surrounding the issue when he recommended a plan to prohibit hunters from driving ATVs more than 25 yards off established roads on public land.

Ford, who said the proposal was necessary to protect wildlife and habitat, shelved it after Lent and other hunters circulated petitions calling for his removal and printed bumper stickers that read: "Ban Tommy Ford, Not ATVs."

"They mislead the public on everything. They made it a personal issue," Ford said. "But it (off-road restrictions) is going to happen. It's happening as we stand here."

Federal land managers said they will work with various groups to identify roads and trails suitable for vehicles.

Each BLM district will update its resource management plan, and each forest district will work under centralized oversight to develop a system of designated routes and areas.

Every national forest is different and has to evaluate its own needs and abilities to provide for motorized use and recreational use at the local level," said Jerry Ingersoll, the Forest Service's Off-Highway Vehicle Program manager in Washington D.C.

"Many national forests are and will be evaluating those needs over the next few years," he said.

"The answers they get from doing travel planning are likely to be just as different as the national forests are different from one another," he said.

Implementation will vary, but some districts are shooting for as early as 2007.

While federal land managers said it's premature to discuss road closures, they won't rule them out.

"We're growing up as a state and we can't handle the unrestricted cross-country travel like we did in the past," Drumm said. "Every time you go out you find more new trails. Unfortunately, we're going to have to rein them (vehicles) in."

___

On the Net:

U.S. Forest Service: http://www.fs.fed.us/

Bureau of Land Management: http://www.nifc.gov/

The Wilderness Society: http://www.wilderness.org

The Blue Ribbon Coalition: http://www.sharetrails.org/

http://www.freenewmexican.com/news/13451.html#

 

I was quite surprised when I learned that some places still have wide open riding. This is good for us riders when we need to establish new routes, but if somebody insists on ripping around all over the place, it is just going to cause problems for everybody.

Here in So. Calif. there are several types of federal land, and it is a system that works to ballance a variety of interests. There are a number of BLM open areas where you can ride anywhere you please whether there is a trail or not. There is regular BLM land where you can ride established trails and roads, and this is the most common type you will encounter. And then there is wilderness where there is no riding at all. National forests vary. Forests near populated areas have "closed unless posted open" routes, and forests in more rural areas tend to have "open unless posted closed" policies. But nowhere in the national forest can you just ride anywhere you please. If you shoot a deer way off of a road, you are going to have to pack it up to a road to load it on your vehicle.

Sounds like Nevada riders have been spoiled, maybe more than they deserve! If some abuse the privelage, all it can lead to is more restrictions for everybody.

 

The problem will come when the FS & BLM inventory all the routes. If your trail isn't on the inventory, it will be closed as if it never existed....

 

The "trail inventory" has always been the favored ploy for eliminating routes!

My experience has mostly been that goverment employees favor closing anything they can, because it just makes their job easier. Roy Denner has a favorite saying..........."it's easier to close something than to manage it". If the only access to an area is on foot, that severely restricts the possibilities that anybody is ever going to be out there (especially in the desert!), so the Ranges can just sit in the office with their feet up on the desk and sip coffee all day. They don't have to even go out and patrol. And, many public employees got into that line of work because they have a "hidden environmentalist agend", so that is something one has to constantly look out for. If irresponsible riders are going to rip everything up, it just plays into their hands!