9.4 mil acres in Southern Utah

[goodtimes]

Every year there are more motorized recreationists and less acreage to recreate on. This is an incontrovertable statement, and contributes to the self-fulfilling prophecy that motorized recreation is bad. As more and more people attempt to ride and drive on less and less acres, the problems will continue to compound.

In other words, it is not environmentally responsible to do this.

But is it environmentally responsible to NOT protect some land? As long as the population continues to increase, and our "standard of living" continues to rise, there will be more and more people engaged in every form of recreation (more hikers, more bikers, more OHV'ers, more people on quads, more people in kayaks, more people doing *whatever*). We have a limited amount of land, and it will continue to be squeezed down until there is nothing left. How many off road trails have been lost to urban sprawl, compared to wilderness areas? I have no firm data, but I'd bet we lose 10 trails to sprawl for every trail we lose to wilderness, if you look over the last 50 years.

It's not like someone is saying we want to turn this 9 million acres into Wilderness and then we will set aside these several 100k acre tracts for motorized recreation to offset your loss.

But they are open to motorized recreation right now. If they left several 100K acres open to mechainzed recreation....then what exactly are they doing? Nothing. They would simply be reducing the the size of the protected area. Instead of 9.4 million acres, the wilderness area would then be 8.4 million acres. Who is to say that the original plan did not include 15 million acres, which was later reduced to 9.4 million acres to continue to allow access.
(I don't know if it was, or not...just posing a question)

The other issue you touch on is the multi-million dollar Anti-Access environmental lobby (business) in the U.S. This is self serving industry, in and of itself.

And the OHV lobby is not? Every "lobby" exists for only one reason...to convince politicians to vote in favor of whoever is lining the lobbiests pocket.

crap, I'm sounding like a damn enviromentalist....

 

[goodtimes]

None of the government agencies we talk about have full fundingto really study thier lands and COMPLETELY manage them in the best way. Look at the billions of dollars of backlog the national park service has as an example.

Funding is definately a problem. If the funding was there, enforcement would be improved, and maybe, just maybe, people would think twice about doing something stupid. Maybe. It would be a start.

 

[cruiseroutfit]

But is it environmentally responsible to NOT protect some land?

So are you saying you beleive that motorized recreation is bad for the land? How can you comprimise which land your "damaging" hobby can take place on. This is the exact mentality I have a hard time understanding. We have set aside Wilderness and WSA's, why do we need to "protect" more from damage many of us don't beleive exists. Southern Utahs eco-system gets more disturbance from a single flash flood than 50 years of vehicle travel. Sure there are areas where human impact has visual disturbed the terrain, but I would argue that they havn't done any "damage" in the big picture of an areas eco-system.

Land can be protected and still keep historic access to motorized travel. Are you a beleiver that National Forests all over the country are NOT being protected because they allow human impact beyond the foot? I think some of our forests are as healthy as they have been in the last 100+ years, and improving!

I have no firm data, but I'd bet we lose 10 trails to sprawl for every trail we lose to wilderness, if you look over the last 50 years.

Not in Utah, not even close... I can only think of a few isntances where "urban sprawl" has lead to a trail closure, and they were questionable and or private trails from day one. While there have been many cases over the years, I would guess they amount to at best 5% of the trails lost to Wilderness & WSA designations.

Who is to say that the original plan did not include 15 million acres, which was later reduced to 9.4 million acres to continue to allow access.

It wasn't, the original plan has continued to grow with each appearance... they make no allowances for continued recreation in their "wilderness inventories" to them it is all or none.... None it shall be.

And the OHV lobby is not? Every "lobby" exists for only one reason...to convince politicians to vote in favor of whoever is lining the lobbiests pocket.

But the OHV community doesn't exploit a problem that doesn't really exist. The Redrock slide show consist of dozens of photos of "damaging" vehicles in the Moab area... what they don't show is the other 99.9% of the area that looks as if it had never been touched by man. They use propoganda to push their agenda. They call us irresponsible, lazy, rednecks, noisy, smelly and "damaging" to the environment... The OHV community just fights for to keep public land public!

 

[cruiseroutfit]

Funding is definately a problem. If the funding was there, enforcement would be improved, and maybe, just maybe, people would think twice about doing something stupid. Maybe. It would be a start.

Absolutly!!!

I heard a number once from a BLM rep here in Utah... approx. 50% of their annual budget is spent on litigation... It makes me SICK to think of how much good could actually happen on the ground if the WAG's could sit back for a bit and let them enforce their current laws.

 

[Jonathan Hanson]

It's the irony of some poor SOB who got his legs blown off in Korea, fighting for the good ol' US of A, not being granted access to his public lands that gets me. Or some retired folks, cruising into their twilight years in the Winnebago, who may not be able physically to hike or bike into pristine areas. Should they be denied access because they are simply, the "previous generation"?

KC, I understand your concern, but I still don't understand what you are saying. Are you saying that every wilderness area in the country should have a road into it for the use of the elderly and handicapped? What about the Grand Canyon? Should there be a road to the bottom? It's a spectacular piece of public land, and totally unaccessible to Flo and Lester in their motorhome. Denali? The view from the top is great, and utterly unattainable to a big segment of our population.

I don't know of a single type of habitat or scenery in the U.S. that doesn't have motorized access into part of it. That is enough for every handicapped person I know; they have told me so.

And others here are still talking about some sort of mitigation when land is "lost" to wilderness designation. I don't understand what part of five percent you guys don't get! The fight to preserve the last bits of wilderness in the country is mitigation.

You are correct that motorized use of public land is growing. Especially as more and more Americans succumb to flab and spurn hiking shoes for that electric-start ATV. Again, what would you do? Cancel all wilderness designation and build more roads? What's your vision here for the next 50 years? Cover every square mile of public land with ATV trails?

Regarding the claim that more land has been "lost" to wilderness than to sprawl. Not sure where to begin there. I consider "sprawl" to be any increase in land use that cuts that land off from recreational use or eliminates its value as wildlife habitat. But let's compare the 107 million acres of wilderness to other totals of U.S. land use:

80 million acres in the U.S. planted in feeder corn.
75 million acres planted in soybeans.
61 million acres planted in alfala.

About 95 percent of all the crops I just listed go to feed livestock. So we have twice as much land in the U.S. devoted solely to cow food as wilderness. And that doesn't count 780 million acres of grazing land, most of which is at least multiple use.

Total cropland in the U.S. is 350 million acres.

Developed urban and rural residential land totals 139 million acres.

50 million acres of paved roads and parking lots.

In the face of this, I will continue to press to preserve every last square inch of American land that remains in anything even resembling pristine condition.

 

[Jonathan Hanson]

For those more afraid of wilderness than sprawl, this from the Arizona Daily Star:

Freeways up to 24 lanes wide, new interstate bypasses, commuter rail — none will prevent a quagmire of traffic congestion through the coming Tucson-to-Phoenix "megalopolis."
That's the warning from a longtime Pima County transportation official, who says there's no way officials can find the money or physical space to build a road-and-transit network big enough to handle Arizona's projected growth over the next three decades.
By then, forecasters have predicted wall-to-wall development along the interstate highways serving this "Sun Corridor," which they say will create a megapolitan area all the way from Prescott to Sierra Vista.
By 2040, up to 13.3 million people will live in the corridor — 8 million more than now, and the freeways are already jammed at rush hour.
Ten years from now, driving on the interstates could be an extremely frustrating experience, says Ben Goff, Pima County's deputy transportation director.
There will be no point in looking for an alternative route, he predicts, because it will be no better than the one you're already driving.

Oh, but if we could just stop those whacko environmentalists . . .

 

[kcowyo]

KC, I understand your concern, but I still don't understand what you are saying. Are you saying that every wilderness area in the country should have a road into it for the use of the elderly and handicapped? What about the Grand Canyon? Should there be a road to the bottom? It's a spectacular piece of public land, and totally unaccessible to Flo and Lester in their motorhome. Denali? The view from the top is great, and utterly unattainable to a big segment of our population.

I don't know of a single type of habitat or scenery in the U.S. that doesn't have motorized access into part of it. That is enough for every handicapped person I know; they have told me so.

And I just mentioned to Chuck recently that I stay out of these threads because I feel like I'm walking into a machine-gun fight with a handful of rocks.....

Well clearly I'm more of an authority of irony than conservation. Perhaps I am projecting my views of the snowmobile vs. no snowmobile in Yellowstone debate, onto this proposed bill in Utah. Basically I am opposed to restricting access of an area to one group of users while allowing others to use it as they wish. FTR, I felt the same way years ago when Augusta National tried to ban women and African-Amercian golfers on their course.

I speak not from a conservationists standpoint, but rather from a sense of what I personally believe is right and wrong. I believe because one group has more funding, PC support or simply whines louder than another, that that group should not be unchallenged in their efforts to restrict usage of public lands.

I don't wish to see the remaining pristine areas of our country overrun with mines, logging trucks, oil rigs, etc. Nor do I wish to see them taken over by rock buggies, mud boggers or white Toyotas with fridges. I don't believe there should be roads built just for those with special needs. I believe in equal access or no access. Unfortunately man's rebellious nature has resulted in damage to certain areas because not everyone will respect equal access or current laws.

Lastly, I have this perverse (childish?) need to point out irony wherever I see it. For instance -

....every one of them expressed outrage at non-handicapped people who trot out the handicapped banner to achieve their own ends.

I can relate. I feel the same way when some DINK families (Double Income No Kids) trot out the "preserve this and that, for future generations," banner. We are not guaranteed a tomorrow. Shouldn't we take advantage of, and make the most of, the opportunities we have today?

I would enjoy reading your take on the dichotomy between the "live your life today" mantra that you & Roseann have encouraged but making preservation and conservation for tomorrow, your life's work.

Respectfully -

 

[cruiseroutfit]

...Regarding the claim that more land has been "lost" to wilderness than to sprawl...

Apples & Oranges...

We are not talking about farms in the midwest, we are not talking about the suburbs of Arizona... we are talking about the remote regions of Utah where urban sprawl is not and has not been an issue. I can see your reasoning in the "number", but your numbers have literal face value on the situation in Utah. You can't compare the Urban sprawl of metro cities not farmland with the situation in Utah.. no two ways about it.

The motorized advocacy groups are not asking for more or new trails... rather the right to use existing ones... its literally as simple as that. I spent alot of time in areas that would be and have been lost to Wilderness, I live literally less than 5 miles from a Wilderness area, bordering the SLC valley. (Lone Peak Wilderness Area, est. 1977). I see this issue everyday... its not the picture being painted by the WAG's

The numbers I think are important...
Utah total acreage: ~54 million acres (~2% of US total)
Utah Wilderness & WSA: (.8 mil & 3.2 mil repectively)
Utah Forest & BLM Property: (~10 mil & 22.9 mil respec.)

I think we are being "protected" just fine

 

[Clutch]

That is enough for every handicapped person I know; they have told me so.

...and how many is that?

It would be more scientific, if the survey of the handicap population that you pondered this question with, was in the thousands. Then, I would like to see the percentages.

I have watched my father deteoriate over the years with MS, I have built him contraptions so he can live like a person who can actaully use their legs. Anything from hoists to help him on his electric-start ATV, so he can enjoy his land, raised garden beds, elevators so he can go from each level of his house that he built when he was healthy, etc....so he can pretty much get around on his own without be coddled by me. He is a tough S.O.B. I can tell you story after story what this man has accomplished. I am amazed he is still alive. Refuses to give up the fight.

He would of loved to go to the botton of the Grand Canyon...when he was healthy enough to do it. Too bad, the Tank Chair wasn't around 20 years ago.

Does the trail to the bottom need to be paved...no.

Johathan (I love ya brother! But)...do not give out other people's opinion without first being in their shoes, or wheel chair for that matter.

Does the entire earth need to be accessable....deffinately not.

I stated earlier in this post what true wilderness should be. No humans, period!...Now if that rang true, do think the agenda would change of a certain user group?

We need some sort of balance, not extremes one way or another. Which there are too many people alive today, to have balance. What to do...what to do?...I don't know if I have an answer. I know I am going to fight to keep open existing roads and trail systems. Hey, they are already there, what is it truely hurting?

This battle for land isn't anything new.


This morning Alice and I went for a dirtbike ride in one of my favorite places...saw the survey markers....damn, another great trail lost to the McMansion. There used to be no houses out that way, now right before the trail head, the desert is plowed under...and McMansions...stand it's place. I am sure some green, will move into one of those, and we loose another place to recreate. Ummm...how does grading the land under and putting up a stucco hut, make you better than me???

 

[goodtimes]

So are you saying you beleive that motorized recreation is bad for the land? How can you comprimise which land your "damaging" hobby can take place on. This is the exact mentality I have a hard time understanding. We have set aside Wilderness and WSA's, why do we need to "protect" more from damage many of us don't beleive exists.

YES!!!! Mechanized travel does indeed damage the land. Of this there is no doubt (where there was once undisturbed flora, there is now a trail, or worse, a paved road--tell me there is no damage while keeping a strait face!). The big question is how much damage are we going to inflict before we decide that it is OK to set some places aside so our kids and grandkids will have somewhere to go to get away from "the city". Wilderness designations protect not only from run-away ya-hoos on ATV's and drunken rednecks in 4x4's (not to be confused with law abiding, environmentally concious explorers--there is a difference...), but it also protects from developement...you can rest assured that there will be no strip mall or Starbucks in the middle of a wilderness area.

Southern Utahs eco-system gets more disturbance from a single flash flood than 50 years of vehicle travel. Sure there are areas where human impact has visual disturbed the terrain, but I would argue that they havn't done any "damage" in the big picture of an areas eco-system.

This is the biggest reason I like BLM land. Washes are open bank to bank, provided you are not running over flora, unless they are marked as closed. At least this is how I understand it. As much impact as a vehicle has, the next big monsoon storm will flood the wash, scour the rocks of any tracks, and remove any plants that were growing. Now if we could just get people to stop leaving their trash in the washes so it doesn't end up downstream. But, this logic only works in washes that have large areas draining into them...thus alot of water running during storms. The same does not hold true for roads along ridge lines, or across large flat plains. There is rarely enough water to scour those areas clean.

Land can be protected and still keep historic access to motorized travel.

I agree, which is why I said I am torn on this subject. I do think we should have mechanized access to historically accessable sites (but not "open" access). Access needs to be managed in some fashion--because the American public [in large] is unable to control itself when given the opportunity to explore. You get what we have today--trash all over the place, everything is full of bullet holes, wildcat trails outnumber legal trails, etc. Without the resources to keep things under control, the land management agencies simply cannot do their jobs. Now there is a problem...

Not in Utah, not even close... I can only think of a few isntances where "urban sprawl" has lead to a trail closure, and they were questionable and or private trails from day one. While there have been many cases over the years, I would guess they amount to at best 5% of the trails lost to Wilderness & WSA designations.

I'd be willing to bet if you had aerial photographs of any large city in America dated from ~50 years ago and superimposed a current photograph over it, you would be surprized at how big the cities have gotton. As they grow, the cover more land...mixed use trails get covered up as well. The only trails that don't get covered, are those that are paved, or protected in some fashion.

But the OHV community doesn't exploit a problem that doesn't really exist. The Redrock slide show consist of dozens of photos of "damaging" vehicles in the Moab area... what they don't show is the other 99.9% of the area that looks as if it had never been touched by man.

Unfortunately, the problem DOES exist! The OHV community as a whole has a substantial impact on the environment. I believe that if the OHV community pays attention to what it is doing, and takes steps to mitigate the damage that we are causing, it would be a sustainable activity. Impact will still be there, but it would not be out of control like it is today. But to say that OHV use does not have a negative impact on the environment is simply putting blinders on.

The OHV community just fights for to keep public land public!

The OHV community fights to keep public land open for mechanized recreation. The "other" community fights to keep public land open for non-mechanized recreation. Both sides are fighting for what they believe in (which is what makes America great). Everyone should support the side of the fight they believe in...and both should be ready to realize that reality exists somewhere in between the two.

And I'm still torn on the issue. :snorkel:

 

[cruiseroutfit]

YES!!!! Mechanized travel does indeed damage the land. Of this there is no doubt (where there was once undisturbed flora, there is now a trail, or worse, a paved road--tell me there is no damage while keeping a strait face!). The big question is how much damage are we going to inflict before we decide that it is OK to set some places aside so our kids and grandkids will have somewhere to go to get away from "the city". Wilderness designations protect not only from run-away ya-hoos on ATV's and drunken rednecks in 4x4's (not to be confused with law abiding, environmentally concious explorers--there is a difference...), but it also protects from developement...you can rest assured that there will be no strip mall or Starbucks in the middle of a wilderness area.

I can say it with a strait face... While I fully agree that we are "impacting" the land, I disagree that legal OHV use is causing significant damage to the worlds eco-system as a whole. Mother nature can evolve, adapt and repair, just as mankind has over the years... Some of the areas included in the RR bill were once great forests with meandering rivers... they are now barren deserts with deep gorges carved over millions of years. Nature adapts to the minimal impact OHVs have.

You must remember that Wilderness nor WSA designations do not stop illegal OHV use, in fact in some cases they just promote it as historic routes are suddenly closed and rouge OHV users assert their rights.

There was a handicapped vet, older gentleman in Utah last summer that rode his ATV a short stretch into a WSA on a now closed route. He was driving a route his ancestors had years before him whole mining in the lower portion of the SR Swell... He politely invited the media and the BLM to come out and watch him assert his rights. To date I don't know what stance the BLM took. Johnathan, don't use your handicap "statistics" for a second in Utah... I can think of a handful of handicap individuals that are PRO-MOTORIZED and anti-Wilderness based on the fact it excludes them from visiting their favorite destinations, just as they had for the past 50 years... We have two BOD members on the U4WDA that are legally handicapped and their love for the outdoors matured into 4wd's with their loss of use. The past president of the local Toyota Tacoma club is parapalegic, his extremely built Tacoma is equipped with a hoist for his wheelchair... I know for a fact he deserves a right to use EXISTING roads. I am by no means saying we should make every place on earth accessible, nobody is... but I am saying we should preserve historic access into these areas, no ifs ands or buts...

This is the biggest reason I like BLM land. Washes are open bank to bank, provided you are not running over flora, unless they are marked as closed. At least this is how I understand it.

This is not true for all BLM land... each area is evaluated by its field office and motorized travel designations are set. In "most" of Utahs BLM land, the are is limited to "existing routes" only, and with each travel plan revision more of those turn to "designated routes" only. The actual area impacted by man is minimal in these areas. Do we need to teach more proper backcountry ethics? Minimal impact? Leave no trace? Sure... but education will always be needed and the hardest to accomplish.

I'd be willing to bet if you had aerial photographs of any large city in America dated from ~50 years ago and superimposed a current photograph over it, you would be surprized at how big the cities have gotton. As they grow, the cover more land...mixed use trails get covered up as well. The only trails that don't get covered, are those that are paved, or protected in some fashion.

I have hundereds of maps of Utah, starting in the 1880's and continuing to this day. We (U4WDA) have collected thousands of pages of WSA & Wilderness documentation, as well as reveiwed GIS & route data from all over the state of Utah. I stand by my assertion that the trails with "qualities" and "recreation value" that we seek... have had little closure from urban sprawl. Take Moab for example... How many trails there have closed on behalf of urban sprawl in the last ten years? Very few (Lower Helldorado & Proving Grounds come to mind.), and those were not established trails, covered by federal and state laws.

Why is Utah so different in this respect?? We have such an abundance of public land, and the majority of our recreation areas exist almost exclusivly on public land (with the occasional State Trust Land). Our closures come at the hand of "environmental damage" most often spurred by lawsuits from the WAG, or Wilderness & WSA procedings.

Unfortunately, the problem DOES exist! The OHV community as a whole has a substantial impact on the environment. I believe that if the OHV community pays attention to what it is doing, and takes steps to mitigate the damage that we are causing, it would be a sustainable activity. Impact will still be there, but it would not be out of control like it is today. But to say that OHV use does not have a negative impact on the environment is simply putting blinders on.

I guess we will have to agree to disagree... I don't think the "problem" as it is called exists like others would have you beleive. I spent 50+ days on the trail last year, almost all in Utah... I can't think of an area that had irrepairable damage and or damage beyond the healing powers of mother nature (fire, flood, snow, etc.)





The OHV community fights to keep public land open for mechanized recreation. The "other" community fights to keep public land open for non-mechanized recreation. Both sides are fighting for what they believe in (which is what makes America great). Everyone should support the side of the fight they believe in...and both should be ready to realize that reality exists somewhere in between the two.

And I'm still torn on the issue. :snorkel:[/QUOTE]

 

[Clutch]

I know one of the arguments of some environmentalist is errosion.

Doesn't the Earth itself cause the most? If it wasn't for errosion, we wouldn't have the vistas we have now....

We should ban the Earth...."Bad Earth...very.....bad bad bad..." [/sarcasm]

 

[Jonathan Hanson]

Jonathan (I love ya brother! But)...do not give out other people's opinion without first being in their shoes, or wheel chair for that matter.

Sorry, Warren, but that's the wrong challenge to send my way. I've spent a year and a half of my life on crutches, thanks to a congenital knee and foot problem and multiple operations starting when I was 12. The knee is now artificial, so I won't be putting in the backpacking mileage I used to. So do I suddenly want roads built into all the places I used to hike in 20 miles to see? Um, no. Why? Because defending wilderness isn't about me; it's about something bigger.

And as to how many handicapped people I know, can I just guarantee you it's more than the usual pudgy ATV rider who pontificates about handicapped access? I worked with Todd Albaugh and the Physically Challenged Bowhunters of America on the Bugle article; they have about 400 members as I recall. Call 'em up and ask them if they want roads bladed into wilderness areas for their own access.

But we're getting off track with these basic debating tactics (I'm just as guilty).

The simple fact is, wilderness is in danger of disappearing from our world; roads and 4WD trails aren't. That's why I'm on the side of the former.

 

[cruiseroutfit]

...So do I suddenly want roads built into all the places I used to hike in 20 miles to see?...

...The simple fact is, wilderness is in danger of disappearing from our world; roads and 4WD trails aren't. That's why I'm on the side of the former.

Your painting the motorized argument as something it is NOT... We (only speaking on behalf of those I converse with)... do NOT want new roads... that has never been an arguements. Its the fact that countless existing roads and trails would be lost due to Wilderness classification. Is some cases they have "cherry stemmed" the existing ROW's into the W/WSA, but the WAG's are pushing against that in nearly every case.

 

[Clutch]

Sorry, Warren, but that's the wrong challenge to send my way. I've spent a year and a half of my life on crutches...

Then I owe you an appology...then, you do know. I did not know that about you. :beer:

Your earlier statement struct a cord.