Wilderness Bill Clears First Hurdle in Congress
Photo by Sven Martin
A week ago I wrote that IMBA, the International Mountain Bicycling Association, had formally lodged testimony opposing H.R. 1349, a bill (in Congress) that would remove the blanket ban on bikes in Wilderness areas within the United States. IMBA's philosphical opposition wasn't entirely surprising--they have long insisted that outright opposing the ban on bikes is unproductive. IMBA's move to actually submit congressional testimony opposing the bill, well, that did surprise a lot of people since IMBA issued a press release more than a year ago, stating that they wouldn't interfere with the Sustainable Trail Coalition's (STC) effort to get this bill introduced and passed through Congress. If you are wondering what all this Wilderness talk is about, check out this primer.
When news of IMBA's testimony went public, feces hit the fan in many corners of the Internet. We are in the process of obtaining interview time with both STC and IMBA, whose representatives have been in the nation's capitol of late. In the meantime, it's worth noting two things:
First, The House Natural Resources Committee passed H.R. 1349 in a vote of 22 to 18. The bill must now move to the floor of the House of Representatives.
Second, the New England Mountain Bike Association and the San Diego Mountain Biking Association have both created a petition demanding that IMBA not lobby against mountain biking in Wilderness areas. I am making no assumptions about your position on the matter, but if you do feel bikes belong in Wilderness areas, then GO HERE TO SIGN THE PETITION.
Screenshot of the petition in question
If you are content with IMBA's position, then, well, just keep on keeping on.
In the near future, we'll be bringing you interviews with leadership on both the IMBA and STC side of this particular coin. Stay tuned.
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Meanwhile the conservation infighting will only benefit the destruction of wilderness protection. Both sides need to sit down, talk, and give ground. Then present a unified front.
Also, looks like a session and press fit bb sucks.
This cannot be overstated. Hikers, equestrians, mountain bikers, hunters, fishers - all have to work together.
Every hunting group I've come while riding across has always been friendly. The last was descending a trail in Eastern Washington this fall. We asked where they were heading (opposite directions from us) and they asked us if we'd had seen any three pointers.
youtu.be/Gid6tAV3tyc
Do I want to stop Randonee Skiers from skiing in the wilderness with their mechanical fritschi bindings, skins and fat skis? Nope!
We should have empathy on other human powered (or horse, if you insist) activities in the wilderness and beyond. I bike and guess what, I also mountain climb, hike, rock climb and backcountry ski just like most of you.
The article said the Hunter and I use the word loosely was shooting at a deer and shot the girl by mistake, sorry as a hunter you know that does not happen. The hunter got buck fever and shot before he knew what he was shooting at.
I agree 99% of hunters are safe reasonable people but, I will never ever ride in the woods in an area with hunting, like having an accident with a bike and a car the bike always looses.
Helps to also have loud and obnoxious riding buddies with you, hootin and hollering.
For what it is worth, I am a gun owner, but not a hunter (excepting varmit), but have friends that are avid hunters as well as those that think it is a terible thing.
For a mountain biking association, IMBA sure fights hard against mountain biking...
#f*ckIMBA
I've spent some time hiking through hills with friends prior to when they are allowed to hunt, looking for animal paths, etc. Saw and spooked a beautiful three point buck in the Teanaway, just on the backside of Roslyn last fall. I appreciate hunting and nearly all hunters use all of the animals meat. However, I personally generally prefer to enjoy the animals living, despite the fact that I buy steak from the store and have someone else do the killing and prep work most often. There is no thrill in killing an animal, just the challenge of the hunt and the thankfulness for what the animal provides to us.
The problem is that IMBA has been trying to negotiate with these horsemen and wilderness advocates for decades. They would rather die than give an inch to mountain bikers.
The Sierra Club is and has always been the enemies of fun.
All you need to do is look at who supports them(Feinstein, Boxxer, Waxman to name a few).
I remember 8 or 9 years ago, those three got together to BAN kid's motorcycles, because of the 'risk' of lead poisoning. Nevermind that NO kid had EVER been poisoned from the lead 'content' in ANY motorcycle, they went ahead and did it anyway. I owned a small motorcycle franchise at the time, and I remember all of a sudden, one day the manufacturer called and said 'you can't sell ANY kid's motorcycles, quads, or parts 'til further notice',
I can't remember if it was the DOT, EPA, or who, but one(or more) federal institutions had to get involved to stay the execution(they couldn't 'undue' what those a*sholes had already done).
In any event, if you enjoy outdoor activities of ANY kind, The Sierra Club is basically your mortal enemy
Hmmmm, almost as if this was the purpose all along.
As a hunter and a mountain biker I want access for both.
Don't you think you'd be willing to share five or ten trails in the wilderness? Currently there's zero. Who's being selfish here?
You can't ride a bicycle in a designated "Wilderness Area" in the US because that is the way the regulations were written. Note that there is a huge difference between a statute and a regulation, with Federal Statutes passed by elected representatives and signed into law by the POTUS, while the CFRs are written by agency employees and are supposed to implement the details.
The following link will give you an idea of what the consequences will be:
www.wilderness.net/toolboxes/documents/ranger/DNF_WR%20CFRs.pdf
The maximum would be a $5,000 fine and / or up to 1 year in jail.
The reasons given are:
1) wilderness is meant to be a place apart from the modern world so only traditional uses and tools are appropriate
2) to protect sensitive areas from damage
3) to provide for spiritual enhancement either from the solitude provided to visitors or for people just knowing that they exist.
Then they ban wheeled carts, which have been around for a long time and reduce damage to sensitive areas, but allow shoes, skis and canoes of modern design made from modern materials. Go figure.
I can literally take a motorbike on Saturday morning and ride straight into a Natural Reserve here in Sweden, I will meet a few hikers, ride out and nobody will do anything to me. They will shout at me, shame me, call me a killer of nature, but a chance a Police Car will be waiting at the entrance to the park, is close to zero. And I am speaking about an area close to a city center. As long as I don't do it on a regular basis, don't leave a truck on a parking lot, have no license plates on the motorbike, I am virtually untouchable. Same in Poland. With a certain dosage of bad luck, one of the people I meet on trail can call Police and they may send a helicopter to track me and give directions to the Police cars. However long story short, most bans here are impossible to execute, they just make you feel bad for breaking them. And nobody will give much damn about bicycles or e-bikes.
In Poland in Tatry National Park it is forbidden to ride bikes and there are only few entries to the woods. So you may get caught mountain biking there. But people still do it outside of tourist season. From time to time I ride in areas banned for bicycles. I don't wear a T-shoirt stating this though...
As to your "go figure", well I don't condone it, but I find it perfectly understandable how a certain group of people got into places allowing them to put themselves in sweet spots and remove the competition. Calling upon a higher virtue and looking for an enemy is a rather old political move...
@WAKIdesigns thanks, I couldn‘t have said it better.
I have no idea how likely you would be to get nicked. When I lived in Oregon, there were miles of trails on land owned by logging companies adjacent to my property which were a lot more enjoyable to ride than the wilderness area trails , so I never bothered.
There was a single officer, paid for by the lumber industry, who patrolled the private forest lands looking for things like Meth labs, Cannabis grows, illegal dump sites, and misuse of the roads and trails.
If you went out without being registered with the lumber company which owned the land you were riding on, you would stand a pretty good chance of being caught and sent off until you were registered. If they caught you again, you would probably be given a citation for trespassing.
Unless you had a motocross bike with no license plate and lived out in the woods. The sheriff in a truck can't chase you down. They relied on checking license plates against lumber company records. No plate, no tracking.
I have hiked and skied a lot in Wilderness Areas in Oregon. Hiking, you are fairly likely to meet a Ranger in the more heavily used areas. Get a few miles beyond the heavily used areas, and they are very rare. Once there are a couple feet of snow on the ground, they used to go away for the season. I no longer live there, so my experience is a few years out of date.
If you were seen on a bicycle they would probably have someone watch the parking areas, and you would get a $300 ticket. If you were in one of the more desolate areas and did not enter from a developed parking area, I am guessing that you would get away with it. I know of a recent incident where someone was photographed carving their initials in a railing at a popular area, and the Forest Service actually tracked them down out of state and gave them a citation.
I have met some people on Snow Machines deep in the Three Sisters Wilderness. They had maps which were out of date and showed the area as being outside the Wilderness. I didn't report them. I mean, really? I was the only other person in the area, and we were a good 10 miles in from the parking area. If I had reported them, they would probably all have received one of those lovely $300 tickets.
i think one of the words used to describe people like that is "hidebound".
I am a mountain biker AND a long distance backpacker. I believe that Wilderness areas were named and set aside to do one thing and one thing only: to preserve their wild nature so that future generations can see the wildness that our generation has. Wheeled vehicles and powered vehicles are prohibited in Wilderness areas because they fundamentally change the environment to a much greater degree than foot traffic.
Look at how much maintenance is required to keep established, designed MTB trails from degenerating into rutted, muddy messes. How do you propose to do that kind of maintenance on wild places which have been damaged by knobby tires? The answer of course is that it will not be done at all.
Why can't mountain bikers be satisfied with the access they have to developed trails and not push to damage pristine, sensitive wild areas?
If we reverse the rolls and I asked you this question, how would you feel? Preservation and enjoyment of the wilderness is not mutually exclusive to the activity of hiking. Bicycles are also not wheeled vehicles, they are human powered bicycles akin to your shoes or randonee touring skis.
The reality is that any human access "damages" the wilderness, or what we refer to more commonly as "trails". That being said, hiking and cycling have pretty similar wear. Horses on the other hand completely trot out trails and leave feces everywhere.
This is an unnecessarily pessimistic view of what our government does. There have been 4679 bills proposed in congress this year. Many of them are like the one we are debating - small tweaks to existing legislation that a small group brought to the attention of a few congresspeople. The respective committees debate them, and some of them pass. There is not some overarching conspiracy that binds these little bills together in some master plan to screw people over. The vast majority of them can be taken at face value. Only the big ones that make national news suffer from all of the dishonest politicking.
I really REALLY want more access to wilderness areas. I'd be lying if I said I haven't poached a trail or two that, though labeled as wilderness, inexplicably connect the dots between legal riding areas. So, on one hand, the work of STC is incredible and serves my personal interests wonderfully.
My concern with STC is aligning themselves with representatives that, quite frankly, don't seem too concerned with responsible use and also have a very mediocre track-record when it comes to land use and conservation. Sure, removing this blanket ban will put the decision of access into the hands of the land mangers. But can't they be trusted?
Question: Who are these land managers? What interests are they protecting? With the deep pockets of lobbyists and the strong pull of anti-environment groups, is it that far-fetched to assume that land managers might make decisions that are, in fact, NOT in the best interest of the land?
I don't think so, but that's just me.
Well, yes. STC hired a lobbyist to get this bill to Congress. That does not affect anything I said. STC had a tiny amount of money to spend compared to lobbyists on issues that affect everyone in the US, just like lobbyists for many of the 4679 bills. And as for net neutrality, I think it is an obvious example of dishonest politicking. There is no reason it should be a Republocrat vs. Demican issue, but somehow it is. I, for one, see no reason I shouldn't be allowed to pay more to ensure my telesurgery control data gets priority over some other guy's porn or cat videos. Does that affect your opinion of my other arguments, because I think it shouldn't; they are unrelated?
Federal employees of the US Forest Service who oversee wilderness areas.
What I am arguing is that most small bills like this, that affect small numbers of Americans, can be taken at face value, even though the STC hired a lobbyist to help with the process. Sure, it is true that something may be tacked on to this bill, but it is also true that something can be tacked on to any of the 4679 bills proposed in Congress. So, why not do something we think is valuable for fear of something unrelated getting attached to it? That unrelated thing could be attached to anything if the bill we care about doesn't pass; we have no control over that either way.
The slippery slope arises if other influences take hold. If you're not willing to acknowledge that possibility, then that's okay, but it's worth discussing, at least.
What is not true? Who cares who sponsored it? At the end of the day it is the words in the bill that matter. It is this partisan bullshit that causes most of the problems with our government. Too many people don't give a shit about substance, all they care is that their team wins the vote count.
Since the bill would allow land managers to permit bicycles, where currently bicycles are banned, then one might say that it weakens the wilderness designation, as now people can access the wilderness using bicycles. I support this weakening of the wilderness act, because it means more people will experience the wilderness, leading to more public support for the protection of wilderness. The extra damage to the wilderness is worth the extra access.
The records of McClintock and Bishop have what to do with this?
There's a tab you can select to turn on the land owner overlay. It won't give you every bit of detail, but you'll at least know what department is responsible for a given spot of land.
Unless you consider your bike a person, allowing bikes in wilderness does not allow more people to experience the wilderness.
You are playing stupid word games. People who like riding bicycles will experience wilderness area more if they are allowed to ride bicycles in them.
"They have a lot do with it as they are the writer and major supporter of this bill."
And the bill has a particular language. If a bill with the exact same language were introduced by Jerrold Nadler, would it make a difference? If so, why?
Yes, it would make a difference if the bill was introduced by anyone who didn't have a history of trying to erode federal protection of public lands. I'm sure you'll have something to say about that, but it's irrelevant because whether or not it's all partisanship or grandstanding, it hasn't happened.
More people spending more time in the wilderness leads to greater public support for the preservation of wilderness.
Opposition to bills solely based on who supports or proposes them instead of based on the content of the bills is a major problem with our current politics.
I've always voted Democrat in fed elections, and only ever voted for a few pragmatic Republicans in local races. This bill is not some "slippery slope" to allow oil drilling on Wilderness, it is a 2 line amendment that allows "non-motorized bicycles", wheelchairs, strollers, and game carts.
This is one bill so you're stretching it pretty far to imply that anyone suspicious of it because of its proponents is the problem with politics. Will you feel better if I tell you that when I vote I vote for at least one republican just so I don't appear partisan?
I realize that lots of mountain bikers will support this bill, and I think that's selfish. I realize that many people will say who proposed the bill doesn't matter, and I think that's incredible folly. I think many of you are using one of those to justify the other. I don't think it's a "slippery slope", I think it's a precisely placed wedge.
Wheelchairs are specifically mentioned, this is the bill's text:
"“Nothing in this section shall prohibit the use of motorized wheelchairs, non-motorized wheelchairs, non-motorized bicycles, strollers, wheelbarrows, survey wheels, measuring wheels, or game carts within any wilderness area.”.
IMBA, I have been a long time member and just let my membership lapse because of this. Your days are numbered if you don't start listening to your base. It's not too late to reject the darkside.
Now STC gets my $. Bacon....Mmmmmmnnnnn
www.wired.com/story/do-nikes-new-marathon-shoes-make-you-faster-a-nike-funded-study-says-yes
An analog can be found in recreational marijuana legislation (at least in California.) Soon to be legal at the state level, but plenty of local jursidictions continuing the ban. I happen to live in a county that ironically spearheaded legal pot, but now is very anti-recreational. And coincidentally, pretty anti-mountain biking despite some serious history with that too.
If HR 1349 and the related Senate bill do pass, there's a big chunk of wilderness here that has sweet singletrack. I'd love to see the local director give it a green light. I doubt it'll happen, but I do think each wilderness unit should be managed at the local level, not nationally. My two cents. . .
In very broad strokes the current mandate that federal land managers work under seeks mutual benefit for all Americans, which might be a hard pill to swallow, but that's the 'U' in USA.
As residents of western states, you and I are fortunate to have better access to most of these lands than many, but those people in other states hold deed to the land same as you and me. Beyond sustaining $880 bn/y recreation industry, I would argue that this carefully maintained estate is responsible for America's actual greatness. Public land gives us clean water and air, it sustains many of the most-complete ecosystems that remain on the planet. It protects our outdoor heritage and history and created our git-er-done sensibility + We have more, better and cheaper recreation opportunities, than anywhere else in the world, except maybe New Zealand (which has a solid public-land model)
Private land is important, but it ensures none of these things - quite the contrary. Sure there are other places where riding and private property co-exist, but the right to roam exists only on the whim of public landowners, and our litigious nature here in the US doesn't exactly inspire hope, should the landscape of management/ownership change. Sorry for the long-winded response.
BTW, how many region residents out here would sign a petition to allow the proposal to be discussed, if I could put one together or something?
Anyway, let's push onward to even more exploitation of natural resources and destruction of natural habitats in the name of human progress and entitlement (or in the case of POTUS, subhuman progress and entitlement).
IMBA: Great idea! Hold my beer.
"Mechanized Versus Motorized
We also want to briefly highlight a growing need for Congress and the federal agencies to more carefully
consider the differences between mechanized and motorized uses of trails and public lands. Frequently,
legislation will give direction to agencies regarding “mechanized or motorized” uses, lumping both
platforms into a single sentence. In many cases, treating these uses as the same or even substantially
similar does not reflect important differences in patterns of use and unique management requirements."
Source: www.imba.com/sites/default/files/HR1349_IMBA-Testimony_12-6-17.pdf
First, I live near several wilderness areas and would love to ride through them. However, if we're being honest there really isn't THAT much prime trail that is really great for riding. The net gain of useable trails from being able to access wilderness areas probably isn't going to be that large. But any gained access is good, right? Well consider the potential downside to this: how is the conservation community going to react? We all know how they are going to react, so I guess the question really should be why should we give a shit how they react? If you look at a list of the largest charitable groups in the US, it is littered with conservation based organizations. The Wildlife Conservation Society has revenues topping $200M and over a million members. Sierra Club has 3M members. I'm sure there are a ton of others with even larger membership bodies. If this passes it will be GAME ON for their legal/political wing. War will have been declared and they'll crush us. Literally crush us with a bottomless pool of resources. IMBA has what, 40k members? Yeah, they would crush us both in court and with their lobbying efforts.
Even if we put that reality aside for a moment and assume this passes, doesn't get litigated for a decade, and somehow we out-lobby some of the most powerful forces in American politics. This isn't a silver bullet that instantly gives us access to the 235M acres of wilderness area out there. You still have administrative processes that have to be followed. Impact studies and all sorts of bureaucratic crap that will take time. And effort by those working in an already underfunded government agency. So you can count on this taking a long ass time, and in the mean time all other efforts to grant trail access will come to a screeching halt. Despite the setbacks we see in the headlines and are frustrated by, new trails are being built. I left this sport a long time ago (partly to work in politics oddly enough,) and when I came back to it I was nothing short of amazed at what was available to riders. As someone who spent their younger years building and riding illegal trails because that was absolutely the only stuff to ride, I was blown away that we were considered to be even remotely "legitimate." The pendulum is swinging in our direction folks; its just that in the world of politics and law and bureaucracy the pendulum swings really, really slowly. My point is that it won't be for long if this passes. We will have pulled the rug out from under ourselves I fear. The scraps that we have fought for, that finally became an actual seat at the table (call it a seat at the kids' table if you want...) will be gone. The conservation giants will say "f*ck these guys" and lump us with motorcycles and monster trucks and strip mining.
I think what we need going forward is a new designation to protect and conserve lands. Something that allows snowmobiles and motos and rock crawlers and hikers and mountain bikers and all the other outdoor recreation you can imagine. Take it and protect it. Protect it from loss but still let us use it for crying out loud. And part of that is to stop this Wilderness Study Area nonsense that is the real problem. Land gets declared a study area, we lose access, then it just stays that way for decades. Its bullshit. WTF are they studying? Nothing, its just a redtape version of more wilderness. This is the bill we should be rallying behind, from Senator Daines of Montana releasing some of those study areas: www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/2206/text
Finally, do you really think Congressman McClintock authored this to help us? Part of why I moved west was to leave the world of poliltics behind. I was heavily involved in that world, even working as a consultant to a Presidential candidate. Trust me when I say these things usually aren't done because they want to help us little guys. There is almost always an ulterior motive, and I'm pretty sure that's the case here. It seems like there are attempts all over to drive wedges between groups and distract attention from a larger effort to reduce the land under federal control. Lots of little fires being started to keep attention and effort from being unified against that effort. We're a very small fire in that plot.
I'm a big believer in Occam's Razor, that the simplest explanation is usually the correct one. The more you look at this, the less simple it gets however. Is the likeliest explanation that we all of a sudden have enough clout to change decades of conservation rules? Or is it that somebody is using us to stir the shit and distract from the bigger picture? As for me, I'm giving IMBA the benefit of the doubt for now and assuming they are much more versed in the nuances of this mess than I am, and I'm renewing my membership. Let the downvoting commence...
Is anyone yelling about all the 3-5 story 'luxury condos/apartments' going up.everywhere?
www.wilderness.net/map
The amended legislation is significantly better and seems like a genuine attempt to do what it says on the package: allow each land management unit of the Federal Government to make a decision about wilderness areas under their jurisdiction on a case by case basis. So I'm now cautiously supportive.
It could still use some work to make it clear that local land manager discretion is not complete and must still be grounded in findings showing that bicycle use in each particular case is consistent with the purposes of the Wilderness Act.
What would set at least my concerns to rest, is language making it clear that changes in trail uses should be made on a case by case basis and supported by findings showing that allowing the use of bikes would not damage the wilderness values of the specific area where use was allowed.
This bill as it stands is an unfunded mandate and I think you may be massively discounting the amount of time, work, and money it takes for a land manager to make a reasoned and legally defensible decision on use. Since the goal here is to allow bikes on some trails on some wilderness areas but not other trails it will take a lot of work to figure that all out and build the administrative record to support the decision in each of the 765 Wilderness Areas.
I agree that this work should be done, and I'm ok adding things to the to do list, but it's pretty messed up to ask the Forest Service and BLM to do all of this without, you know, providing them any money with which to do it. You have to understand that this is being considered at the same time that budgets for the Forest Service and BLM are decreasing and ever larger portions of what budget they is being consumed by fighting wildfire. Most of these units have unfilled positions, and folks doing multiple jobs already, simply because they can't afford to hire anyone.
Setting that aside, by failing to be specific enough in it's drafting it leaves some important questions as to the bounds of their discreation up to varied interpretations. Depending on the course taken by the land managers, it could create significant litigation risk from the "no bikes ever" crowd.
I want Congress to do this, but we'll all be better off if they do it right.
STC’s amendment only clarifies language of the law to enforce original intent of the Wilderness Act. That original intent is well documented. It was abused and misinterpreted by the forest service on behest of radical anti human extremists.
Too bad you are blind and side with our enemies.
You are a troll. I'm done here.
I know a few land managers. You're right - they have a ton on their plate. But this is what they do, and I don't think it would materially add to their workload.
Thanks for the perspective. It’ll be interesting to see what the regulation looks like coming from the national forest service as that will have a lot of impact on the burden on local land managers.
But the more I think about it you are likely right that the national rulemaking implementing the change in law would likely elect to keep current restrictions in place until a local unit makes another decision. To do otherwise would risk likely successful NEPA litigation.
Also, agree that “this is what they do” but revisiting the travel plans for each of the 765 Wilderness Areas still seems like a lot of work to me.
What’s your take on the pace of that happening?
As far as making friends with your local Forest Supervisor goes, this has been important forever. A good way to do this (and speed things along) would be to start raising money for the studies and stakeholder outreach these local landowners likely will need to do in order to open up these trails.
Autonomy of local land manager is large on paper but often runs into politics related to local congresspeople (who control the purse strings) and the appointees in senior leadership positions like the Secretary of Interior (who the power to set policy tone and also override local decisions).
I've come around to being optimistic that there may be some real benefit here. That said, I still think that a more narrowly tailored bill, one that called out recent designations with historic mountain bike access and trails where designations significantly disrupt connectivity for consideration for MTB use would have been a better move.
What planet do you live on? How many times has some jackass forest service ‘land manager’ torn out our trails? It’s the shittiest part of living in his state. That state lands keep them from taking it all
@isilverman: are you suggesting the NY TImes article for me or drunknride?
I also think the people who do not contribute to society tax-wise should mow my lawn every once in a while...
Down with IMBA
Here in the eastern sierra (inyo & humboldt toiyabe), a lot of higher elevation riding is in wilderness...hence off limits.
Appears the recreation act/not red tapeact is moving too slow for stc.
Will probably sign petition.
Gerry
"Mechanized Versus Motorized
We also want to briefly highlight a growing need for Congress and the federal agencies to more carefully
consider the differences between mechanized and motorized uses of trails and public lands. Frequently,
legislation will give direction to agencies regarding “mechanized or motorized” uses, lumping both
platforms into a single sentence. In many cases, treating these uses as the same or even substantially
similar does not reflect important differences in patterns of use and unique management requirements."
Source: www.imba.com/sites/default/files/HR1349_IMBA-Testimony_12-6-17.pdf
I did on an comment board last week.
Asked him if had attacked any trail users lately, sadly he did not answer. :-)
I do both, and seems like if I take my jeep anywhere in the northwest, I can count on some subaru folks giving me the stink-eye... yet bikers can go build machine built badass trails, and it's "saving nature"...
The guys who made the wilderness act did so because they saw people getting lazy with cars, phones, and urban life and wanted to encourage folks to go out there, not drive through it. There was no mountain biking then, the stupid special interest clubs came in and made that mess... and with enough money, they win the battle and get what they want. mountain bike clubs? there was nothing like this back when they got banned.... the original intent of wilderness act was to make people go out and enjoy the mountains, not save it from being used.
Fine the shit out of people who abuse the land, let locals decide what might be best in their wilderness areas...
www.logicalfallacies.info/presumption/slippery-slope
His view is backwards, no doubt, but in large part that must have to do with his lack of exposure and experience to what real wilderness and backcountry experiences are like, be it on foot, horse or bike. I think it's akin to the fear that humans naturally have of others that are not like themselves. For some, that might be food and culture. Others it might be language or race. I'm not suggesting the promotion of all this is ok, however certainly there's room for little old us mountain bikers to work and fit in along (well us) hikers, mountain climbers, backcountry skiers with our mechanical randonee and telemark skis or snowshoes, backcountry horsemen and so on.
Ride on!
And why reverting Obama’s land grab that everyone in Utah opposed is a bad thing?