show menu previous photo   start slideshow   next photo
While past environmental abuses of American public lands have been blamed primarily on logging, mining, and energy development, motorized recreation is turning out to be the next great threat to ecosystems across America. Off-road vehicles (ORVs) - dirt bikes, ATVs, dune buggies, snowmobiles, jet skis, etc. - pose one of the fastest growing threats to our public lands. Their use is poorly managed, splintering the landscape into a mess of motorized routes. ORVs are designed to conquer nature. They are built to travel directly over and across the most rugged, and often the most fragile terrain. In the process, they severely impact the land, water, plants and animals that live there. Because of rapidly improving technology, off-road vehicles can travel many places that were formerly too difficult to access. A few passes by off-road vehicles in the same place creates unauthorized, renegade routes. The Forest Service alone has more than 60,000 miles of such renegade routes. These routes cause even greater resource damage than regular routes, because they cut through pristine lands and are not built to Forest Service specifications. Off-road vehicles compact and erode soil, spread noxious weeds, pollute the air and water, disrupt wildlife and directly damage trees, shrubs and other plants. Erosion caused by off-road vehicles can be disastrous, creating massive ruts as seen in this picture from the Land Between the Lakes in Kentucky. Dirty wetlands make for dirty drinking water, and 70% of our nation's drinking water traces its source to National Forest lands. Many towns have had to spend millions of dollars to deal with sediment-laden water caused from roads and off-road vehicles. Off-road vehicles also compact the soils they drive on. Compaction makes it difficult for water to seep into the soil, increasing erosion next to a route. Soil compaction can also make plant survival and revegetation virtually impossible. Off-road vehicle damage vegetation and create large patches of barren lands, which are susceptible to erosion, flooding, landslides, and noxious weeds. Toadflax, knapweed, leafy spurge, and many other noxious weeds are found along roads and trails. Weed seeds get stuck on off-road vehicles and then released into the churned-up soil, which provides perfect conditions for weeds to thrive. Off-road vehicles create conflicts between users of our public lands. Motorized vehicles push hikers off trails and alter the outdoor experience for enjoyers of quiet and wild places. The two-stroke engines commonly used in jet skis, motorcycles, and snowmobiles burn so inefficiently that up to 30% of their fuel/oil mixture flows unburned from the engines directly into our soil and water. Perhaps the most severe example of off-road vehicle-induced air pollution happened during past winters at the West Entrance to Yellowstone National Parkwhere employees had to wear gas masks because of the snowmobile exhaust. Off-road vehicles significantly impact wildlife by lowering life-expectancy, decreasing viable habitat, disturbing the animals, and displacing them from important breeding, calving, and feeding grounds. On most of our public lands government agencies do not have the manpower or incentives to properly enforce off-road vehicles. Because of lack of enforcement, renegate routes caused by illegal off-road vehicle use will continue to exist. ORVs must be restricted to legally designated routes (that are specifically posted as open for use) where properly funded enforcement exists. ORV use should also be eliminated in roadless and other ecologically sensitive areas. Wildlands CPR seeks to limit off-road vehicle use by shaping national policy and empowering grassroots conservationists with knowledge and tools combat this threat to our public lands.