All Entries Tagged With: "wilderness"

Wilderness Regulations Threaten Off-Road Recreation

The latest craze in state and federal land management is to designate large tracts of public lands as “wilderness,” a term that sounds perfectly reasonable and innocuous. After all, who doesn’t love “wilderness?”

View of Yosemite national park

Of course, there’s a catch: The Federal Wilderness act of 1964 states that areas that are “untrammeled” by man (a.k.a., untouched) can be set aside as wilderness. This means they can never be built upon, sold, leased, mined, etc. It also  means that “wilderness” can’t be used by trucks, 4×4’s, ATVs, snowmobiles, and even mountain bikes.

According to the Blue Ribbon Coalition (a special interest group dedicated to responsible recreation on public lands), the flurry of Wilderness bills being proposed and/or signed into law has raised a red flag in the access community and other multiple-use interests.