Help repeal the roadless rule in national forrest.

[Valhalla]

https://blueribboncoalition.org/roa...medium=email&utm_term=0_-1339af2ec3-372710686

Every voice matters amd the Blue ribbon coalition makes it easy to voice support.

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[Squatch]

Only if they ban side-by-sides.

 

[CitrusBronco]

Done

 

[itwelder]

lol No.

 

[CitrusBronco]

lol No.

Pretty nice coming from a guy with near endless public lands that are open for use on the west coast. How about we close everything out west that the government owns and see if you feel differently,
Out east we have very few places and it’s mostly private land. local forest service should have the decision on what access is allowed and not someone in DC. But thanks for supporting your fellow countrymen and community.

 

[Nc211]

Supported, if for anything else - wildfire mitigation! Haven't we seen how bad that can be already in not only our country, but our continent (Canada) and the world in general?

 

[itwelder]

Pretty nice coming from a guy with near endless public lands that are open for use on the west coast. How about we close everything out west that the government owns and see if you feel differently,
Out east we have very few places and it’s mostly private land. local forest service should have the decision on what access is allowed and not someone in DC. But thanks for supporting your fellow countrymen and community.

I would not mind. There is little protect land remaining, and I believe protecting what's left is important. I do not feel entitled to drive everywhere.

 

[HighVelocity]

Nope. We have enough bozos on wheels flying all over the place. You want to explore the backcountry? Get your fat ass out of your SxS and go for a walk. It will do you some good.

 

[Prescott Duner]

Nope. We have enough bozos on wheels flying all over the place. You want to explore the backcountry? Get your fat ass out of your SxS and go for a walk. It will do you some good.

Tell that to the guy in a wheelchair!

 

[HighVelocity]

Tell that to the guy in a wheelchair!

Don't try that emotional manipulation BS with me. There are tons of organizations that offer equipment, guides and support for handicapped access. The WA trails association does so out here, I'm sure there are equivalents everywhere. Mobility devices are specifically permitted in all federal wilderness areas.

 

[crzyhawk]

The biggest indicator that I should have something is when the govt tells me I do not need/should not have it.

 

[EasternSierra]

The roadless rule doesn't prevent OHV access per se, and doesn't prohibit use of existing trails in inventoried roadless areas. Repeal of the roadless rule won't have any immediate effect on access to trails. Whether a given area of federal land is open to OHV is a matter of other decisions, not this one.

The "roadless areas" here are inventoried undeveloped National Forest lands over 5000 acres in size (or smaller if adjacent to an existing designated wilderness area). These are areas that have insignificant human impacts to date, but are not otherwise protected from various kinds of resource development.

The roadless rule was originally established to retain the ecological integrity of these lands. Also, because they are roadless and undeveloped, they potentially could be designated as permanent wilderness by Congress at a later date.

In reality, some will eventually become wilderness and most probably won't, based on the last 50 years of controversy over their status (dating back to long before the roadless rule). Wilderness designation proposals often get a lot of opposition. When it does happen, wilderness designation does prohibit OHV use.

The real agenda here is to get more of these roadless areas rendered unsuitable for potential future wilderness designation by opening them to much greater human impacts.

To me, the issue is balance. There is a whole spectrum of land use from preserved to totally destroyed (strip mining, etc.). Most federal lands are somewhere in-between. Of those, a small portion are unmodified but also unprotected from development except for the roadless rule. This isn't an either/or choice, but a question of how much land is going to go into various categories, short-term and long-term.

People are welcome to have their own opinions on what balance is appropriate. Right now about 13% of federal lands outside of Alaska are designated wilderness and another 9% of Forest Service and BLM land is roadless and temporarily off-limits. The rest is too modified to qualify for wilderness designation.

Supported, if for anything else - wildfire mitigation! Haven't we seen how bad that can be already in not only our country, but our continent (Canada) and the world in general?

As for thinning overgrown western U.S. forests, the backlog is so gigantic (thanks to almost 100 years of fire suppression) that the limiting factor by far is funding, not which lands are open to particular kinds of forest management. Prescribed burning is still allowed in inventoried roadless areas to thin forests. Also, quite a bit of these lands are not covered with overgrown low/mid-elevation forests, but are high-elevation western forests that tend to burn catastrophically anyway, or are not even covered with forest. It's complicated.

Pretty nice coming from a guy with near endless public lands that are open for use on the west coast. How about we close everything out west that the government owns and see if you feel differently,
Out east we have very few places and it’s mostly private land. local forest service should have the decision on what access is allowed and not someone in DC. But thanks for supporting your fellow countrymen and community.

The issue isn't about closing all public lands to motorized use. That's just not on the table and never has been. Inventoried Forest Service roadless areas in Florida add up to 50,000 acres out of 1,153,000 acres of National Forests, or 4%. Another 6% is formally designated as wilderness. In Tennessee it's 85,000 out of 698,000 acres, or 12%. Another 12% is designated wilderness.

 

[EasternSierra]

Don't try that emotional manipulation BS with me. There are tons of organizations that offer equipment, guides and support for handicapped access. The WA trails association does so out here, I'm sure there are equivalents everywhere. Mobility devices are specifically permitted in all federal wilderness areas.

I've kinda been on both sides of the mobility situation. When I was young I did a lot of hiking and backpacking in wilderness areas. Now I'm an old fart and I haven't been in one of those areas in 15 years at least. Health conditions limit what I can do in any case. Both then and now I love exploring remote areas by 4x4, but always treading lightly.

As I wrote above, it's not either/or. Most federal public lands are not closed to vehicles.

 

[Prescott Duner]

Don't try that emotional manipulation BS with me. There are tons of organizations that offer equipment, guides and support for handicapped access. The WA trails association does so out here, I'm sure there are equivalents everywhere. Mobility devices are specifically permitted in all federal wilderness areas.

Don't try that emotional manipulation BS with me. There are tons of organizations that offer equipment, guides and support for handicapped access. The WA trails association does so out here, I'm sure there are equivalents everywhere. Mobility devices are specifically permitted in all federal wilderness areas.

So you park your ride at the street and walk in 20 miles to see the wilderness? Vehicles and people going off designated trails include both SxS and 4wd's. Let the local Ranger Districts apply the rules and open/close trails that are appropriate for their particular circumstances. Not a blanket closure of millions of acres of public land.

 

[Tonka Bronka]

This sounds like it goes hand in hand with someone's desire to sell off our National Forests and their resources in a large scale. We have to be careful what we wish for here folks.
Sponsored by Senator John Barrasso (R) Wyoming. Make up your own minds.

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