Road Riporter 9.3

Autumn Equinox 2004. Volume 9 # 3

Celebrating 10 Years of Reviving Wild Places Fighting ORV abuse, resource damage and habitat fragmentation on public lands

Promoting road removal with sound science & economics

Photo by Mark Alan Wilson.

Photo courtesy of Bureau of Land Management.

Restored roadbed in the Clearwater National Forest. Photo by Edgar vanderGrift.

Special 10th Anniversary Issue

By Karen DiBari, Wildlands CPR Board President

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en years ago, a handful of people began a conversation. Who knew it would lead to the founding of an organization and the rise of a national discussion regarding the damage to public lands caused by roads and all terrain vehicles? In this special edition of The Road RIPorter, we honor the 10th anniversary of Wildlands CPR by reflecting on our origins, celebrating our accomplishments, and assessing how our efforts have elevated concern regarding the proliferation of roads and motorized recreation. Throughout this anniversary issue, you will find a timeline describing the work of Wildlands CPR and fellow activists. It’s exciting to recount the many successes over the years to remove roads, limit the use of ATVs, craft local and state policies, and force federal agencies to pay attention to the damage caused by motorized vehicles and roads. Katie Alvord’s essay, “Tapestry” describes the origin of ROAD-RIP (our first name) from its conception in a beat-up Subaru station wagon, to an organization run out of a box of files in her house, to the strong staff, board, and network of supporters that exist today. In “The Evolution of Road Science,” we learn of the dramatic increase in research concerning the impacts of roads and the effectiveness of road mitigation measures, and the need for further study regarding the ecological impacts of road removal. The article “Wildlands CPR and the Natural Trails and Waters Coalition” tracks the collaborative efforts of Wildlands CPR with other organizations and activists across the country to expose the damage ATVs wreak on public lands. And in “ReWilding, ReVisioning,” Bethanie Walder reflects on our vision for Wildlands CPR’s future contributions. Several themes emerge from these articles that speak to why I am honored to be involved with Wildlands CPR. First, Wildlands CPR is an organization that does not waste time waiting for things to get better. We can be proud of our role as an agent of change. Second, Wildlands CPR’s work is grounded in sound science. Third, Wildlands CPR believes in, respects, and is committed to the power of local and regional grassroots activism. Fourth, Wildlands CPR is working to build on shared values and broaden the circle of people who speak out about the damage done by roads and ATVs. Finally, the people involved with Wildlands CPR today are just as energized and committed as the organization’s founders. Although we have accomplished a lot, we still have much to do. We know that if we all keep working mile by mile and motor by motor to knit our lands and waters back together, our successes will continue to multiply. What can Wildlands CPR make happen in the next ten, twenty, or thirty years? We look forward to the day when we will have fulfilled our vision of restoring the tapestry of interconnected, roadless wildlands that sustain natural and human communities. It’s a vision to hold on to.

Wildlands CPR Board and Staff Back row (l-r): William Geer, Sonya Newenhouse, Kiffin Hope, Mary O’Brien, Bethanie Walder, Jason Kiely, Adam Switalski Front row (l-r): Tommy Petersen, Karen DiBari, Greg Fishbein, Dave Havlick, Matt Skroch, Marnie Criley, Amy Atwood.

P.O. Box 7516 Missoula, MT 59807 (406) 543-9551 [email protected] www.wildlandscpr.org

Wildlands CPR works to protect and restore wildland ecosystems by preventing and removing roads and limiting motorized recreation. We are a national clearinghouse and network, providing citizens with tools and strategies to fight road construction, deter motorized recreation, and promote road removal and revegetation. Director Bethanie Walder Development Director Tom Petersen Restoration Program Coordinator Marnie Criley Science Coordinator Adam Switalski Transportation Policy Organizer Jason Kiely Program Assistant Kiffin Hope Newsletter Dan Funsch Interns & Volunteers Becky Cass, Hank Green, Jeff Reoch, Corinne Mullowney, Kaytee Smith, Chelsea Wittmann Board of Directors Amy Atwood, Karen DiBari, Greg Fishbein, Bill Geer, Dave Havlick, Sonya Newenhouse, Mary O’Brien, Matt Skroch Advisory Committee Jasper Carlton, Dave Foreman, Keith Hammer, Timothy Hermach, Marion Hourdequin, Kraig Klungness, Lorin Lindner, Andy Mahler, Robert McConnell, Stephanie Mills, Reed Noss, Michael Soulé, Steve Trombulak, Louisa Willcox, Bill Willers, Howie Wolke

Photo courtesy Sonya Newenhouse. © 2004 Wildlands CPR

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The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

ReWilding, ReVisioning By Bethanie Walder

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pril, 2001, Brown’s Canyon, Arizona. Our annual board and staff retreat began with a lively discussion centered on the question: “How will we know when Wildlands CPR’s work is done?” Very few conservation groups actually talk about “finishing their work,” although there are some notable exceptions (like The Wolf Fund, which worked for wolf reintroduction in Yellowstone, and closed once that goal was achieved). Our discussion was valuable, and our responses included things like: • • •

when there’s a general societal aversion to ORVs in wildlands (that is, when society has taken over our work) when we have “just the transportation system that we need” - or that we can tolerate - on public lands when motorized vehicles are used as a form of transportation, not a form of recreation

Though our mission is extremely focused, it doesn’t always translate easily into tangible targets for success. In that conversation, we didn’t quantify our end goal as a number of acres restored or miles of roads removed — we focused on the processes and societal changes that would make our work unnecessary. In the meantime, however, we clearly have an extraordinary amount of work to do. Our strategic plan, developed last year, is helping us work toward these changes — changes that, when accomplished, would signal that we’ve completed our mission. Our mission – to revive and protect wild places by promoting road removal, preventing new road construction and limiting motorized rec-

Government vehicle, 1940. Photo courtesy of Bureau of Land Management.

— continued on next page —

Historical Timeline of off-road vehicle and road development 312 BC The Roman Empire constructs the Appian Way, the oldest and most important of the Roman Republic’s “highways.” When completed the road was more than 560 km (350 miles) long.

1811 Construction of the Cumberland Road begins – the first federal highway in the United States, connecting Cumberland, Maryland to Vandalia, Illinois.

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

1916 Federal Highway Act passes congress, providing $10 million in funding for road development on National Forests over the next ten years. (FS has 2,795 miles of roads at this point in time).

1919 Post Office Appropriations Act appropriates $9 million for development of forest roads.

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reation – has become more and more relevant. Over the last ten years, we’ve been excited to see how many large and small groups have incorporated our issues into their work. I remember when Defenders of Wildlife called us for advice on developing a roads program. The result, their Habitat and Highways program, has focused significant attention on developing more wildlife-friendly transportation systems. Similarly, we worked with Friends of the Earth (FOE) to challenge Forest Service road funding in the mid-90s. Their efforts became instrumental in the eventual development of the roadless rule and the long-term transportation policy. The Heritage Forests Campaign took the lead on roadless area protection, and we were involved at the beginning of that campaign. After the road funding battles, we teamed up with FOE again, to challenge recreational trail funding; together we co-sponsored a national meeting to address the explosion in off-road vehicle recreation. As a direct outcome, we partnered with The Wilderness Society (TWS) to develop a comprehensive rule-making petition to overhaul Forest Service regulation of off-road vehicles. And that led us, along with TWS, Friends of the Earth, and four other groups, to create the Natural Trails and Waters Coalition, which Wildlands CPR and TWS continue to co-chair, and which focuses exclusively on advancing our off-road vehicle goals nationally. Our work is not, however, focused solely on making connections with national conservation organizations — we’ve helped individual groups and regional coalitions address road and motorized recreation issues as well. For example, we were part of the core group that started the Southern Rockies Forest Network (now Southern Rockies Conservation Alliance). SRCA has three main programs, one of which focuses on off-road vehicle issues and promoting Responsible Motorized Recreation. In 1996, we worked with the Mountain Heritage Alliance in Virginia to stop the expansion of a highway through Mt. Rogers National Recreation Area. In 2002 we co-hosted a workshop with the Southern Appalachian Biodiversity Project and they have been able to use that information to prevent reconstruction of the Hickey Fork road. And just this summer we’ve been helping activists in Utah develop a statewide coalition to increase off-road vehicle monitoring and data collection to challenge the rampant off-road vehicle problems there. The exciting thing about our resources is that so many groups use them, whether they inform us or not. We’ve worked with more than two hundred and fifty grassroots organizations throughout the country to assist them in their road and off-road vehicle fights, and our work has made a real difference on the ground, as shown by many of the stories in this newsletter. One of our favorite things is finding out about successes based on our models and handbooks, like when a grassroots activist in rural Oregon wrote to tell us that he had gotten 84 miles of national forest roads closed using our materials — he went on to call the Road-Ripper’s Handbook his “bible.” And we still get calls from people who are using our handbooks, guides and inventory tools to get roads closed and removed all over the United States.

1921 Congress appropriates $15 million for forest development roads and forest highways on the national forests.

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1923 Arthur Carhart and Aldo Leopold define the concept of wilderness as areas in nature free from the impacts of roads and motors.

Wildlands CPR has exceeded all my expectations and has become the central authority on roads and road removal. Its newsletter is one of the few I read cover to cover and then keep on hand as a key part of my reference library. When you want to know the state of the art, Wildlands CPR is the place to start. — Keith Hammer, Swan View Coalition (co-founder Wildlands CPR)

In the midst of our tenth anniversary, we’ve found it valuable to look back like this at what we’ve accomplished and how we’ve helped change the playing field. It’s been equally valuable to look forward and thoughtfully consider our goals for the future — though we have accomplished many things, we’re still quite far from finishing our work. How to get the public actively engaged in these issues remains a daunting challenge. For example, while polling shows that a majority disapproves of off-road vehicles in wildlands, that majority remains largely unengaged in public lands management. Similarly, off-road vehicle recreation continues to grow, whereas we believe that such vehicles should be used as a mode of transportation, not recreation. In other words, if you want to drive any vehicle on public land, you should be on a road, and if you want to get off the road, you should get off (or out of) your vehicle. Four years ago, when we petitioned the Forest Service to overhaul their off-road vehicle regulations nationally, one of our key points was that off-road vehicles should be kept on designated routes only, with no cross-country travel allowed. We won that battle and changed the debate — off-road vehicle users themselves now publicly state that use should be restricted to designated routes. The devil is in the details, however, and they’re winning on the

1927 Congress appropriates $51 million for road development in the national parks over the next ten years.

1933-1942 Civilian Conservation Corps constructs 126,000 miles of roads and truck trails on public lands.

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

details at the moment, so we’ve redefined our goals on this policy point. As one step, we’ve just defined ten types of places where off-road vehicles should never be allowed. Off-road vehicles aren’t the only issue with a disconnect between public opinion and management action. The vast majority of the public, even in western states with huge tracts of public land, supports protecting roadless areas from road construction, logging and off-road vehicle recreation. Nonetheless, as the political winds shift, Photo courtesy of Bureau of Land Management. so does protection for such areas. The Clinton Administration tried to protect roadless areas, while quiet prevails. Roads will be limited and, where they the Bush Administration is exploiting them. When Wildlands CPR was exist, thoughtfully designed and maintained. Motorformed ten years ago, practically no one was talking nationally about ized vehicles will travel only on these roads. We will the ecological effects of roads. Now, it’s nearly a given: roads cause work cooperatively with diverse communities to ecological problems, they are costly, and we have too many of them. protect and restore our remaining wild places, fosHow many wildland roads we’ll end up with in the long run remains the tering a growing citizenry that supports this vision. key question, and one that won’t be resolved until the public becomes Our focus in the future will also continue to proengaged and demands that land management agencies begin removing, mote success. Where are citizens most successful? rather than building, roads. How have they developed their programs? What Our recent work has focused on this key question of removing lessons do their successes provide for others? And roads as a critical component of wildland restoration. We began with finally, although we will maintain our nationally and the idea that combining conservation biology, activism and law would internationally acclaimed clearinghouse, we are also enable us, and the groups we work with, to achieve our goals — we’ve expanding our efforts to reach broader segments learned that we must add social science to that equation. In the past of the public — the very people we must reach to two years we’ve added numerous economic and socio-political tools to change societal expectations so that motorized our toolbox, tools that are critical to achieving the processes and sociuse is focused on transportation, not recreation. etal changes that might eventually enable us to “finish” our work. Our Consider attitudes towards cigarettes and second2004 model road removal program provides information for public land hand smoke. As recently as 15 to 20 years ago, it managers to create successful road removal programs (from a social was acceptable to smoke nearly anywhere, but now perspective). It is a critical companion to our 1999 ecologically-based smoking indoors and in public places is considered road removal guide. not only inappropriate, but unacceptable. This is a Wildlands CPR will continue as a leader on road and motorized model that we’re trying to emulate, though it may recreation issues. Our work to protect and restore wild places intake more than ten years to accomplish. cludes scientific research and publications, workshops and community Wouldn’t it be fantastic if, ten years from now, outreach, on-the-ground projects, and other innovative strategies. As we could say the same thing about recreational offwe connect science and policy to their social, ecological, and economroad vehicles abuse of our public lands. Wouldn’t it ic contexts, we will expand our reach and develop new constituencies. be fantastic if ten years from now (okay, perhaps a As an organization, when we look to the future we envision little longer than that), Wildlands CPR was no longer wildlands that sustain natural and human communities, where native needed to promote road removal because it was just plants and animals thrive, clean air and water abound, and nature’s so darn common.

1939 Forest Service road mileage reaches 140,000 miles.

1939 Jeeps invented for use in World War II.

1946 First civilian jeeps sold in U.S.

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

1957 FS building nearly 2,800 miles of new roads per year to access timber.

1959 Honda opens first motorcycle shop in U.S.

1960 Yamaha begins selling motorcycles in U.S.

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The Evolution of Road Science By Adam Switalski and Reed Noss

Introduction

When Wildlands CPR was formed in 1994, the scientific basis linking roads and biodiversity was still rudimentary, although field biologists and conservationists had long been aware of road-related problems such as roadkill, landslides, and pollution. As early as the 1920s, scientists kept track of roadkill rates across the United States, Canada, and Scandinavia, where collisions with large mammals often resulted in human injury or fatalities. Beyond simply counting roadkill, however, little research attention was directed at roads — until recently. This article reviews how research on roads has moved to the forefront of conservation study.

Road Research

During the late 1980s and early 1990s, published research articles began to address roads. Noss (1990) was the first to review the literature on the ecological impacts of roads, however, his article was unreferenced, and published in a journal read by few scientists. He found that aside from the direct problem of animals being struck by vehicles, roads provide access to poachers, contribute sediments and chemicals to water bodies, serve as barriers to animal movements, facilitate invasions of exotic species and pests, create noise, air, water, and soil pollution, and degrade scenic and wilderness qualities of landscapes. Over the last 10 years, scientists have increasingly recognized the threats roads pose to wildlife and the integrity of ecosystems. In their 1994 book, Saving Nature’s Legacy, Reed Noss and Allen Cooperrider briefly reviewed some of the existing research on roads, this time in a more accessible publication, while supplying references to the peer-reviewed literature. Then, in 1995 Wildlands CPR asked Reed Noss to assemble a bibliography of literature on the ecological effects of roads. Noss began with existing bibliographies: one he compiled in 1987-88 and updated sporadically through 1990; an annotated database on highway modifications for wildlife compiled by Steve Humphrey at the University of Florida; and

1961 Public land managers raise alarm about motorized scooters being used in the backcountry.

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1963 Suzuki begins selling motorcycles in U.S.

1964 The Wilderness Act becomes law.

Photo by Mark Alan Wilson.

several journal-specific annotated bibliographies compiled by Paul Paquet of the University of Calgary. Together, these databases formed the first comprehensive collection of road literature. As the number of peer-reviewed journal articles related to road impacts increased in the 1990s, symposia and entire conferences were dedicated to road research. Two consecutive conferences in Florida were the first to address the impact of roads on wildlife exclusively. In 1996 “Trends in Addressing Transportation Related Wildlife Mortality” took place in Tallahassee; two years later the first International Conference on Ecology and Transportation (ICOET) was held in Ft. Myers. ICOET continues every two years and is “designed to address the broad range of ecological issues related to surface transportation development, providing the most current research information and best practices in the areas of wildlife, fisheries, wetlands, water quality, overall ecosystems management, and related policy issues.”

1968 Yamaha introduces first official “dual-sport” motorcycle designed for use both on and off road.

1972 Forest Service conducts first Roadless Area Review and Evaluation (RARE) analysis to determine potential wilderness lands. The ensuing controversy eventually results in a new analysis.

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

Additional reviews in the late 1990s revealed the scope of road effects across the United States. Forman and Alexander (1998) reviewed the impacts of roads and found that “based on road-effect zones, an estimated 15-20% of the United States is ecologically impacted by roads.” Riiters and Wichham (2003) similarly reported that over 20% of the U.S. was within 127 meters of a road and that over 80% of the U.S. was within a kilometer of a road. By the turn of the century, researchers for the U.S. Forest Service (who manages almost a half-million mile road system) were acknowledging the impacts of roads. Gucinski et al. (2001) was the first formal Forest Service review of the impacts of forest roads. The Forest Service has started closing and removing roads. Additionally, the U.S. Department of Transportation has reviewed the impacts of their roads and has begun to mitigate their sprawling highway system for wildlife and human safety (e.g. USDOT 2000, USDOT 2004).

The Nez Perce Tribe’s growing watershed restoration programs have greatly benefited from the continued support and interest of Wildlands CPR. We consider ourselves lucky to have such a capable organization as a resource and a neighbor. Thank you! — Rebecca Lloyd Hydrologist, Nez Perce Tribe DFRM-Watershed

Mitigation Science

As it has become more apparent that roads are having a biologically significant effect on wildlife in many areas, research on wildlife crossings and other road mitigation has mushroomed. Europeans have built crossing structures for decades to mitigate the barrier effects of roads on small mammals and amphibians. They have successfully used underpasses to channel small mammals and amphibians under roads (e.g., Langton 1989, Friedman 1997). Europeans have also built dozens of wildlife overpasses and have studied the effectiveness of different mitigation techniques for more than a decade (e.g. Van Wieren and Worm 2001). In the 1970s North America saw its first wildlife crossing structures built. In Colorado and other western states, migrating mule deer suffer considerable mortality trying to cross highways; collisions between deer and vehicles also injure motorists. In 1970, the Colorado Division of Highways constructed a 10-by-10-foot concrete tunnel under Interstate 70 west of Vail for use by mule deer, and used fences to funnel deer to the underpass. A study by the Colorado Division of Wildlife confirmed that hundreds of migrating mule deer used the tunnel but also suggested that larger and more open underpasses would be more appealing and result in greater rates of deer movement (Reed et al. 1975). In southwestern Utah, a narrow bridge (8 meters wide) enhanced deer movement along a ridge. In northern New Jersey, two wider overpasses (30 meters wide) were constructed for horseback riders and deer after a multilane highway cut a park in two (Kuennen 1989). In Banff National Park, Alberta, several overpasses have recently been built, some of which are more than 50 meters wide. Researchers have found that large and rare carnivores, as well as a number of ungulates,

1972 President Nixon signs Executive Order 11644, regulating the use of offroad vehicles on public lands.

1975 Forest Service road mileage reaches 240,000 miles.

are using the overpasses (e.g. Clevenger and Waltho 2000, 2004; Gloyne and Clevenger 2001). In Florida a wildlife overpass built in 2000 allows deer, foxes, coyotes, opossums, and other animals to cross over I-75. Unfortunately, this overpass is too narrow to accommodate larger, more sensitive species such as black bear or panther (R. Noss, pers. obs.). As our highways become wider and carry more traffic, and as our wildlands decrease in size and become more isolated, wildlife overpasses will increase in importance. For example, a proposed wildlife overpass will allow grizzly bears to safely cross Highway 93 (MT) into important habitat. The expansion of grizzly bear range in the U.S. Northern Rockies into the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness is essential for the continued viability of this population over time (Boyce et al. 2002).

Road Removal Science

In 2002, Wildlands CPR funded a special section on roads in the journal Conservation Biology. In addition to publishing some of the most recent research on roads, this section included one of the first refereed review articles to recommend road prevention and removal. Trombulak and Frissell (2000) concluded that their review “underscores the importance to conservation of avoiding construction of new roads in roadless or sparsely roaded areas and of removal or restoration of existing roads to benefit both terrestrial and aquatic biota.”

— continued on next page —

1978 Congress signs legislation adding significant lands to Redwood National Park and mandating their restoration. Appropriates $33 million for restoration, much of which eventually goes to road removal work.

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

1979 President Carter signs Executive Order 11989, strengthening Nixon’s offroad vehicle regulations.

1979 Forest Service conducts second Roadless Area Review and Evaluation (RARE II) analysis.

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1983 Suzuki produces its first four-wheeled ATV for sale in U.S.

1984 Yamaha produces its first four-wheeled ATV for sale in U.S.

1985 Forest Service road mileage reaches 350,000 miles.

Millions of dollars are being spent to remove roads across North America or to mitigate their negative impacts, yet the science of road removal, wildlife crossings, and other mitigation has not kept pace. The limited research on the benefits of road removal to date demonstrates the effectiveness of removal for restoring hydrologic and geomorphic conditions. Switalski et al. (2004) reviewed the literature and found decreases in chronic sediment loss and reduced risk of road-triggered landslides after road obliteration. Similarly, monitoring of wildlife crossing structures has shown benefits in terms of successful wildlife passage (e.g., Clevenger and Waltho 2004), yet few studies have been continued for sufficient time to demonstrate long-term impacts on wildlife along stretches of road with and without crossing structures. No published study has yet examined how road removal impacts fish and wildlife; a University of Montana study will be the first. A new research project on the Flathead National Forest (MT) is assessing the benefits and impacts of different types of road removal on the threatened bull trout. Also, the first study to examine whether terrestrial wildlife are responding to road removal is taking place on the Clearwater National Forest in ID. Wildlands CPR is a key funder for both of these projects.

Wildlands CPR first came to my attention when as Forest Supervisor of the Lewis and Clark National Forest, I realized that these folks had much better monitoring data on road closures than we did. Since then, they’ve assumed a leadership role in helping citizens and forest managers understand and implement effective road decommissioning and monitoring of off-road vehicle impacts. Their latest publication, Investing in Communities, Investing in the Land, is an exciting testament to the achievability of sustainable economies and ecosystems in the rural west. Thank you Wildlands CPR, just in time to resuscitate our beloved lands! — Gloria Flora Executive Director, Sustainable Obtainable Solutions 8

1988 U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission bars the production and sale of threewheeled ATVs in the U.S.

1990 Forest Service rescinds the 40inch rule, effectively allowing off-road vehicles on traditional foot and horse trails.

A University of Montana study currently under progress will be the first to assess the benefits of different types of road removal on bull trout. Wildlands CPR file photo.

Roads in the Context of Conservation Planning

Increasingly, road impacts are considered within the broader context of regional conservation planning. For instance, roadless areas and landscapes with low road densities are recognized in habitat suitability models and population viability analyses as key refugia or source areas for species, such as large carnivores, sensitive to human access and associated legal or illegal killing. In addition, regional conservation planning allows the identification of key areas to implement road closures and wildlife crossing structures, for example in proposed linkages between core areas (e.g., Noss et al. 2002).

Conclusion

Road science has come a long way over the last couple of decades. While once only addressed by a few conservationists and wildlife biologists, road research now is the topic of hundreds of papers, several reviews, large conferences, and an entire text book (Road Ecology, Forman et al. 2003). The problems caused by roads have been well documented, yet more research is needed on how to reverse the impacts of roads through mitigation and road removal. Additionally, roads need to be addressed in a broader context to restore habitat quality and connectivity across North America and beyond. — Adam Switalski is the Science Coordinator for Wildlands CPR. Reed Noss is the Davis-Shine Professor of Conservation Biology at the University of Central Florida and a contributor to Wildlands CPR’s database. Wildlands CPR continues to promote road science and is guiding road removal research on several national forests. Wildlands CPR also maintains a bibliographic database with more than 10,000 citations documenting the physical and ecological effects of roads and off-road vehicles.

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

1992 Congress passes the Symms Act as part of the national highway bill, providing potential appropriations from the Federal Highways Administration for motorized and non-motorized trail development on public lands. The funding is split 30% to motorized trails, 30% to non-motorized trails and 40% to multiple use trails.

1994 Wildlands CPR (then ROAD-RIP) founded during the Road-Fighting Strategy Session, Healdsburg, California.

1995 Forest Service road mileage reaches 380,000 miles.

Spring 1995 Road-Ripper’s Handbook released with guides to the National Forests, National Parks, BLM, and Off-Road Vehicles.

Literature Cited Boyce, M.S., E.M. Kirsch, and C. Servheen. 2002. Bethedging applications for conservation. Bioscience 27 (supplemental 2): 385-392. Clevenger, A.P., N. Waltho. 2000. Factors influencing the effectiveness of wildlife underpasses in Banff National Park, Alberta, Canada. Conservation Biology 14(1): 47-56. Clevenger, A.P., and N. Waltho. 2004. Performance indices to identify attributes of highway crossing structures facilitating movement of large mammals. Biological Conservation (in press). Forman, R. T. T., and L. Alexander. 1998. Roads and their major ecological effects. Annual Review of Ecology and Systematics 29:207-231. Forman, R.T.T., D. Sperling, J.A. Bissonette, A.P. Clevenger, C.D. Cutshall, V.H. Dale, L. Fahrig, R. France, C.R. Goldman, K. Heanue, J.A. Jones, F.J. Swanson, T. Turrentine, T.C. Winter. 2003. Road Ecology – Science and Solutions. Washington D.C.: Island Press. Friedman, D.S. 1997. Nature as infrastructure: The National Ecological Network and Wildlife-Crossing Structures in The Netherlands. Report 138. Wageningen, Netherlands: DLO Winand Staring Centre. Gloyne, C.C., A.P. Clevenger. 2001. Cougar (Puma concolor) use of wildlife crossing structures on the Trans-Canada highway in Banff National Park, Alberta. Wildlife Biology 7(2): 117-124. Gucinski, H., M.J. Furniss, R.R. Ziemer, and M.H. Brookes. 2001. Forest roads: a synthesis of scientific information. General Technical Report PNW-GTR-509. Portland, OR: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station. 103p. Available online at: http://www.fs.fed.us/eng/road_mgt/science.pdf Kuennen, T. 1989. New Jersey’s I-78 preserves mountain habitat. Roads and Bridges (February 1989): 69-73. Langton, T.E.S., ed. 1989. Amphibians and Roads. Shefford, Bedfordshire, England: ACO Polymer products. Noss, R.F. 1990. The ecological effects of roads. RoadRipper’s Handbook, ROAD-RIP, Missoula, MT. Noss, R.F., and A. Cooperrider. 1994. Saving Nature’s LegacyProtecting and Restoring Biodiversity. Washington D.C.: Island Press. 443 p.

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

Photo by Merv Coleman, Bureau of Land Management, Billings District, Montana.

Noss, R.F., C. Carroll, K. Vance-Borland, and G. Wuerthner. 2002. A multicriteria assessment of the irreplaceability and vulnerability of sites in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Conservation Biology 16:895-908. Reed, D.F., T.N. Woodard, and T.M. Pojar. 1975. Behavioral response of mule deer to a highway underpass. Journal of Wildlife Management 39:361-367. Riiters, K.H., J.D. Wickham. 2003. How far to the nearest road? Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment. 1(3):125-129. Switalski, TA, JA Bissonette, TH DeLuca, CH Luce, and MA Madej. 2004. Benefits and impacts of road removal. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment. 2(1): 21-28. Trombulak, S.C., and C.A. Frissell. 2000. Review of ecological effects of roads on terrestrial and aquatic communities. Conservation Biology 14: 18-30. U.S. Department of Transportation. 2000. Critter Crossings: Linking Habitats and Reducing Roadkill. Federal Highway Administration, Office of Natural Environment. 32p. http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/ wildlifecrossings/intro.htm U.S. Department of Transportation. 2004. Keeping it Simple: Easy Ways to Help Wildlife Along Roads. Federal Highway Administration, Office of Natural Environment. 58p. Van Wieren, S.P., ans P.B. Worm. 2001. The use of motorway wildlife overpass by large mammals. Netherlands Journal of Zoology 51(1): 97-105.

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Keep Up the Good Work!

Organizations that we’ve worked with

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ildlands CPR has worked with more than 250 groups around the country to assist them in their road and off-road vehicle battles and to help them promote road removal and restoration. Below is a list of those groups (and we’re sure we’ve forgotten some, so many apologies to anyone we left out). The following three pages include a partial list of examples of how we’ve helped folks make changes in land management on the ground. These changes include everything from litigation assistance to helping groups set up ground-based monitoring programs. The results have protected state and federal lands throughout the entire country. Check out page 22 for more statistics about where and how our work is used.

Adirondack Council, Alabama Rivers Alliance, Alaska Center for the Environment, Alaska Conservation Foundation, Alaska Quiet Rights Coalition, Alaska Wilderness League, Alaska Wildlife Alliance, Allegheny Defense Project, Alliance for a Paving Moratorium, Alliance for Sustainable Jobs and the Environment, Alliance for the Wild Rockies, American Forests, American Hiking Society, American Lands Alliance, American PIE, American Wildlands, Ancient Forest Rescue, Appalachian Biodiversity Project, Appalachian Mountain Club, Appalachian Science in the Public Interest, Appalachian Voices, Arthur Carhart National Wilderness Training Center, Aspen Wilderness Workshop, Big Wild Advocates, Backcountry Skiers Alliance, Bark, Biodiversity Conservation Alliance, Biodiversity Legal Foundation, Bitterroot Mission Group of the Sierra Club, Blue Heron Earth First!, Blue Mountain Biodiversity Project, BlueWater Network, Buckeye Forest Council, Cabinet Resource Group, California Wilderness Coalition, Canadian Parks and Wilderness Society, Car Busters, Cascade Resources Advocacy Group, Cascadia Fire Ecology Education Project, Cascadia Forest Alliance, Castle Crown Wilderness Coalition, Center for Biological Diversity, Center for Earth and Environmental Science, Center for Environmental Economic Development, Center for Native Ecosystems, Center for Sierra Nevada Conservation, Citizens for a Vehicle-Free Nipomo Dunes, Citizens for Conservation of the North End, Central Oregon Forest Issues Committee, Clinch Coalition, Coalition to Fight Phantom Roads, Coast Range Association, Colorado Environmental Coalition, Colorado Mountain Club, Colorado Wild, Conservation Leaders Network, Corridor H

Alternatives, Deerlodge Conservation Coalition, Deerlodge Forest Defense Fund, Defenders of Wildlife, Earth First! Journal, East Kootenay Environmental Society, Eastern Kenai Peninsula Environmental Action Association, Environmental Mining Council of BC, Environmental Protection Information Center, Eyak Preservation Council, Florida Biodiversity Project, Forest Coalition of Pennsylvania, Forest Guardians, Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics, Friends of the Abajos, Friends of the Bitterroot, Friends of the Boundary Waters Wilderness, Friends of the Clearwater, Friends of the Earth, Friends of Metolius, Friends of Nevada Wilderness, Friends of the Northern Rockies, Friends of the River, Friends of the Wild Swan, Fund for Animals, Georgia Forest Watch, Gifford Pinchot Task Force, Gila Watch, Grand Canyon Trust, Grand Canyon Wildlands Council, Great Burn Study Group, Great Old Broads for Wilderness, Green Fire Productions, Greater Yellowstone Coalition, Habitat for Bears Campaign, Headwaters, Heartwood, Hells Canyon Preservation Council, Heritage Forests Campaign, High Country Citizens’ Alliance, Idaho Conservation League, Idaho Sporting Congress, Issaquah Alps Trails Club, James Creek Watershed Initiative, John/Paul & Associates, Karuk Tribe, Kentucky Heartwood, Kettle Range Conservation Group, Klamath Forest Alliance, Klamath Siskiyou Wildlands Center, Lake Wales Ridge State Forest, Logan Backcountry Skiers Alliance, Mattole Restoration Council, Middle Snake Group Sierra Club, Minnesota Ecosystems Recovery Project, Minnesotans for Responsible Recreation, Montana Wilderness Association, Montana Wildlife Federation, Montana Ecosystems Defense Council, Montana

Spring 1995 Bibliographic database with more than 6,000 citations regarding the ecological impacts of roads and off-road vehicles created for ROAD-RIP by Reed Noss and four graduate students.

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June 1995 First Road-Ripper’s workshop, held in Missoula Montana.

Trout, Mother Lode Chapter-Sierra Club, Mountain Heritage Alliance, National Environmental Defense Council, National Network of Forest Practitioners, National Forest Protection Alliance, National Outdoor Leadership School, National Parks Conservation Association, National Wildlife Federation-AK, Native Forest Network, Natural Resources Defense Council, New Mexico Wilderness Alliance, Newton County Wildlife Association, Nez Perce Fisheries/Watershed Program, Noise Pollution Clearinghouse, Nordic and Backcountry Skiers Alliance of Idaho, Northcoast Environmental Center, Northern Alaska Environmental Center, Northern Forest Alliance, Northern Forest Project, Northwest Ecosystem Alliance, Northwoods Wilderness Recovery, Oregon Natural Resources Council, OSPIRG, Pacific Conservation, Pacific Crest Biodiversity Project, Pacific Rivers Council, Panther Action Coalition, Park County Environmental Coalition, Partnerships for a Sustainable Methow, Payette Forest Watch, Peninsular Ranges Biodiversity Project, Preserve Appalachian Wilderness, Predator Conservation Alliance, Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, Public Interest Research Group, Public Media Center, Quiet Use Coalition, Red Rock Forests, Redwood Chapter of the Sierra Club, Redwood Community Action Agency, Regional Association of Concerned Environmentalists, RESTORE: The North Woods, Rocky Mountain Environmental Council, Rocky Mountain Recreation Initiative, Rural Voices for Conservation, San Miguel Greens, Sheep Mountain Alliance, Shenandoah Ecosystems Defense Group, Sierra Club, Sierra Nevada Alliance, Sinapu, Siskiyou Regional Education Project, Sky Island Alliance, Soda Mountain

July 1995 Salvage logging rider signed by President Clinton, allowing expediting logging of dead, diseased or dying timber.

Wilderness Council, South Carolina Forest Watch, South Fork Mountain Defense, Southeast Alaska Conservation Council, Southern Appalachian Biodiversity Project, Southern Appalachian Forest Coalition, Southern Rockies Conservation Alliance, Southern Rockies Ecosystem Project, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, Southwest Environmental Center, Southwest Forest Alliance, Southwest Montana Wildlands Alliance, Spirit of the Sage Council, Stevens Village, Students Against Violating the Environment (SAVE), Surfers Environmental Alliance, Superior Wilderness Action Network, Sustainable Northwest, Swan View Coalition, Taxpayers for Common Sense, The Ecology Center, The Humane Society of the US, The Lands Council, The Walden Woods Project, The Wilderness Society, Trout Unlimited, Tundra Talk, Upper Gila Watershed Alliance, Ursus International, Utah Environmental Congress, Utah Wilderness Coalition, Ventana Wilderness Alliance, Virginia Forest Watch, VisualJourneys, Wallowa Resources, Washington Trails Association, Washington Wilderness Coalition, Watershed Consulting, Weminuche Group of the Sierra Club, Western North Carolina Alliance, Western Resource Advocates, Western Slope Environmental Resource Council, Western Watersheds Project, Whispered Media, Wild Alabama, Wild Earth, Wild Utah Forest Campaign, Wild Utah Project, Wild Virginia, Wild Washington Campaign, Wild Wilderness, Wilderness Watch, Wilderness Study Group, Wildlands Project, Wildlaw, Wilson Canyon Alliance, Winter Wildlands Alliance, World Wildlife Fund, Wyoming Outdoor Council, Yaak Valley Forest Council, Yellowstone to Yukon Conservation Initiative,Yukon Conservation Society

1995/96 Significant floods in the Clearwater region of Idaho cause more than 1,000 landslides, more than 50% of which are road related. Congress appropriates emergency money to the Clearwater National Forest for road removal.

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

Making a Difference, On-the-Ground, from Coast to Coast Grand Canyon Trust (GCT), Flagstaff, Arizona GCT began the San Francisco Peaks Road Inventory Project in 1998, and with 90 volunteers (350 volunteer days) they inventoried every road in this 270 square mile area. The information they collected is the most comprehensive, detailed, and precise information available for an area this size. After completing the inventory, they met with the Forest Service about route-associated resource damage and areas where road mileage exceeded Forest Plan standards. As a result, the Forest Service began a five-forest transportation planning process.

High Country Citizens Alliance (HCCA): Gunnison National Forest In 1995 HCCA began road inventories on 1.2 million acres, and documented road locations and impacts throughout the forest. They identified road densities exceeding 10 miles per square mile in places, and also identified 650,000 acres of roadless areas. 200 volunteers participated in the project. They are now using the data to influence forest plan revisions.

1996 Wildlands CPR releases the Terrible Twelve, highlighting 12 of the most environmentally egregious road proposals in the United States.

Georgia Forest Watch (GFW): Chattahoochee National Forest, Georgia GFW received a mini-grant from the Natural Trails & Waters Coalition that supported an inventory of off-road vehicle routes, and collaboration with the Chattahoochee/Oconee National Forest to address the growing threats of ATVs on public lands. The grant also helped set up monitoring and provided a science-based document to support media work. As a result, the Forest Service closed and rehabilitated the Anderson Creek OHV recreational area, and closed Rich Mountain road, an 8-mile eroding nightmare on the northern border of Rich Mountain Wilderness. GFW’s work led to excellent coverage of the ATV issue by the Atlanta Journal Constitution and NBC News, as well as a more active volunteer base and a broader discussion of the problems of ATVs by the general public.

Vermont Forest Watch Wildlands CPR has provided strategic and technical assistance to Vermont Forest Watch (VFW) on and off for many years. In the 1980’s, VFW and other groups sued the Forest Service over proposed road construction in the Lamb Brook Roadless Area; they won and prevented the road. In 2003, Natural Trails and Waters provided a mini-grant for an off-road vehicle monitoring program. To date, VFW has monitored the southern half of the Green Mountain National Forest for winter and summer off-road vehicle use. Their monitoring documented an increase in cross-country travel and illegal route construction, and resulted in better enforcement by the Manchester Ranger District. The district now spends 21% of their enforcement time dealing with illegal off-road vehicle use, nearly twice that of other forests in the region. In addition to addressing off-road vehicles, VFW is once again working to protect the Lamb Brook Roadless Area. The area is proposed for wilderness designation, and this time it is threatened by a wind-turbine proposal.

Roads are the route of wilderness destruction. For ten years, Wildlands CPR has led the conservation movement in cataloging the ecological impacts of roads and off-road vehicles, closing and reclaiming unnecessary and destructive roads, and opposing deadly new roads in wildlands. — Dave Foreman

June 1996 First on-the-ground road removal workshop held near Glacier National Park, Montana (with 30 participants from around the country).

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1996 First issue of The RoadRIPorter published.

June 1997 Wildlands CPR sponsors a symposium entitled: “The Ecological Effects of Roads: Implications for Planning,” at the Society for Conservation Biology Conference in Vancouver, British Columbia. More than 100 people attend.

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Making a Difference, On-theWith: Washington Trails Association (WTA), and Issaquah Alps Trails Club About: Washington State ORV funding The Work: • Wildlands CPR, WTA and Sierra Club co-hosted a gas-tax activists summit in 2001 to develop strategies for diverting state gas taxes away from off-road vehicle route acquisition. • In 2003, NTWC provided a minigrant to the Fair Trails Coalition to support this decades-long battle to change state gas-tax regulations. The Result: • In 2004, the state changed their gas tax law, reducing motorized recreation funding from 80% to 30% of available gas tax funds. The rest of the funding is now split between non-motorized rec (30%), general recreation facilities (30%) and a pool of funds for competitive grants (10%).

With: Hells Canyon Preservation Council (HCPC) About: Hells Canyon National Recreation Area, Idaho and Oregon The Work: • Wildlands CPR listed the proposed road “Overlook Two” as one of the worst proposed/existing roads in the country as part of our Terrible Twelve Campaign. • We worked with HCPC for ten years on the Hells Canyon Comprehensive Management Plan (CMP) Tracking Group to develop and promote a Native Ecosystems Alternative for the area. The Result: • We helped prevent construction of the Overlook Two Road, which would have severed key migratory routes for mule deer and elk. • The Forest Service finalized a new CMP in 2003. The plan includes closing (and hopefully decommissioning) 200 miles of roads, and limiting off-road vehilce use to designated routes only.

With: Sky Island Alliance About: Coronado National Forest, Arizona The Work: • Wildlands CPR met with Sky Island Alliance in 1997 to set up a road inventory program, and again in 1999 to host a road removal workshop. The Result: • In 6 years their program has involved 600 volunteers, who donated 20,000 hours to inventory 2,000 miles of system roads and 1,000 miles of non-system roads: 60 miles of roads have already been removed, with more scheduled. • Sky Island Alliance is working with other groups to promote road removal and inventories on the Gila and other national forests in New Mexico and Arizona.

-Ground, from Coast to Coast With: Minnesotans for Responsible Recreation, and Minnesota Center for Environmental Advocacy About: Off-road vehicles on state and federal lands in Minnesota The Work: • Wildlands CPR and NTWC provided financial and strategic resources to support media and state legislative efforts to control off-road vehicles. The Result: • New forest plans came out this summer; the plans for the Chippewa and Superior National Forests both ban cross country travel and restrict travel to routes previously designated through NEPA analysis, or low quality roads. • In addition, the state of Minnesota has passed ORV bills in 2003 and 2004. Each contained good and bad provisions: the most recent legislation prohibits ORVs in wetlands if they cause damage, while the previous year’s law banned cross country travel by ORVs on all state lands. Enforcement of both these laws remains a challenge.

With: Florida Biodiversity Project (FBP) About: Big Cypress National Preserve (BCNP), Florida The Work: • Wildlands CPR listed Alligator Alley and its off-road vehicle access into BCNP as one of our Terrible Twelve Roads in 1995. • FBP sued the Park Service to develop a recreation plan, AND • Wildlands CPR provided $5,000 for litigation to defend the Park Service’s plan to close off-road vehicle access to all but 400 miles of designated routes. The Result: • The magistrate upheld the park’s good ORV plan, though the judge still has not signed the final decision. Controversy continues... • When the ORV plan is fully implemented, it will protect more than 100,000 acres that were previously impacted and it will prevent impacts on another 600,000 acres of the preserve. 200,000 acres of land have been closed to ORVs through this process.

July 1997 Wildlands CPR publishes its first economics report: “Understanding National Forest Roads and Economics.”

1997 Conservation organizations sue Yellowstone National Park over the use of snowmobiles in the park.

November 1997 Forest Service announces its intention to develop a long-term transportation policy; they also begin working on roadless protections.

January 1998 Wildlands CPR hires Jacob Smith to start our off-road vehicle program and opens an office for him in Boulder, Colorado.

Tapestry By Katie Alvord

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ummer 1992, the Ottawa National Forest, Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. Jasper Carlton and Kraig Klungness bumped over a Forest Service road in Kraig’s beat-up Subaru station wagon. Around them they could see road densities that were far too high, leaving wildland habitats far too fragmented -- as they were in most public forests across the country. “What we need,” said Jasper, “is a group that will go after roads.” He was talking to the right person. Kraig had already helped start two small environmental groups, and though he didn’t know it that day, he was about to co-found a third. As they traveled through the Ottawa’s mixed deciduous and conifer forests, Kraig and Jasper developed a vision. Such a group should integrate the solid legal strategies of Biodiversity Legal Foundation with principles of conservation biology, said Jasper, then BLF’s executive director. It should be as committed and specific in its approach as Alliance for a Paving Moratorium, said Kraig, then an APM board member. And, Kraig added, thinking of The Wildlands Project, it should base its work on a vision of vast North American wilderness restored. We envision . . . .

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Photo by Marcel Huijser.

At the time, I served as APM’s executive director. When Kraig phoned me shortly after his trip with Jasper, he suggested we organize a national meeting involving representatives of APM, Biodiversity Legal Foundation, The Wildlands Project, and others who’d worked on the issue of roads. He wanted to color in the vision, to generate strength from unity, to get roads closed and to restore public wildlands in a big way. His determination was infectious. As I started writing grant proposals and raising money, it became clear that funders, too, saw the vision as promising, and as one that could fill an important need.

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January 1998 Wildlands CPR staff present the concept of road removal to more than 200 road engineers and wildlife biologists at the second International Conference on Wildlife Ecology and Technology, in Fort Myers, Florida.

April 1998 Wildlands CPR publishes the Road-Ripper’s Guide to Wildland Road Removal, the fifth and final guide for our Road-Ripper’s Handbook.

In February 1994, the three nonprofits and other key activists came together at one small national meeting to brainstorm cutting edge approaches to fighting the proliferation of roads on public wildlands. The new effort would use innovative legal strategies, be based on solid conservation biology, and be sweeping in its geographic scope. We had a vision of North American wilderness, restored. . . . . envision a tapestry . . . . What emerged from that meeting as the RoadFighting Strategy Project quickly morphed into the Road Removal Implementation Project, or Road-RIP. The lead groups dropped from three to two, with The Wildlands Project providing a 501(c)(3) umbrella and Biodiversity Legal Foundation providing technical support. Kraig and I agreed to codirect the effort, and Jasper and Kraig’s original vision was on its way to becoming an organization on its own. Still, for about a year our seedling group consisted of little more than a file box in my living room. It was a time when even many environmentalists were aware of neither the great damage done to ecosystems by roads, nor their insidious proliferation on public lands. We needed a brochure, and we wrote one. We needed to let local groups know about the best strategies to get roads closed, strategies that activists like Keith Hammer had used successfully in Montana’s Flathead National Forest and that could be used across the nation. So, with help from Keith and others, we wrote the Road-Ripper’s Handbook. We needed to teach activists how to use these tools, so we devised a training workshop. And we needed a base of information, of scientific data that would verify the damage done by roads, so we commissioned Reed Noss and a crew of grad students to build an electronic bibliography for us.

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1998 Fund for Animals and Biodiversity Legal Foundation settle their lawsuit with the National Park Service over snowmobile use in Yellowstone. The settlement calls for the development of a comprehensive EIS on winter visitor use.

May 1998 Wildlands CPR co-publishes, with Friends of the Earth, “Trails of Destruction,” highlighting the growing problems with offroad vehicles and trail funding on public lands.

The only good road in wildlands is a dead road. Erasing the snarled tangles of roadways through what is supposed to be wilderness is important and noble work. Wildlands CPR is fighting the good fight against frightening odds. There ought to be an environmental protection medal and CPR ought to get it. --- Annie Proulx

By about a year and a half later, we had a nice little package of tools. Only one problem: after years of activism, Kraig and I were both tapped out. We needed to pass our package to fresh folks with lots of energy. But who? Everyone we knew was already overcommitted. I phoned around for advice. “You can’t just put the organization in a box, hand it off to new people, and expect it to work,” said one respected nonprofit consultant. Yet we saw little choice. So we advertised. And we got lucky. In response to our call for an executive director, we had the great good fortune to receive applications from two young women: Bethanie Walder, fresh from University of Montana’s Environmental Studies Master’s Program, and Marion Hourdequin, a new graduate of Princeton University. Both seemed highly dedicated and passionate about environmental issues. Though unproven, they each had stellar potential and references -- so impressive, in fact, we decided to hire them both.

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Once Bethanie and Marion had agreed to codirect our seedling group, they came to Houghton, Michigan, where we’d worked from home, and spent a few days with us. Then we did exactly what we were told we couldn’t do: handed them our Perhaps more than any other single circumstance, Wildlands CPR owes its success to the set of decisions made at this critical juncture: Bethanie’s and Marion’s decisions to apply for a challenging, low-paying position with questionable security and no health benefits; ours to offer them a codirectorship; theirs to take that on, and exercise their considerable intelligence, insight and energy to nurture the original vision. . . . . a tapestry, interconnected . . . . Under Bethanie and Marion’s tutelage, the main office moved to Missoula. New and very talented people came on board. More money came in. Workshops were held, activists trained, and slowly, from around the country, word trickled back to Missoula of battles fought, some battles won, awareness raised. After a first successful year, Marion returned to graduate school, and Bethanie stayed on to guide the group into its own 501(c)(3) status and a new name: Wildlands Center for Preventing Roads, or Wildlands CPR. So it was that the file box in my living room swelled into a collection of activist tools, and then burgeoned into a much larger and flourishing thing. Seeds we had planted back at that meeting in February 1994 took root and grew. We set a goal: raise awareness that wildland roads cause enormous ecological problems. A few years later we set a similar goal: raise awareness about off-road vehicles. Activists from around the country began to use our tools. Funders took note. Most important, more activist energy went into fighting roads and off-road vehicles, more US Forest Service units began to address closing roads, and pretty soon the Forest Service, under Mike Dombeck, actually acknowledged that excess roads on public lands were a problem. Then, in 2003, current Forest Service Chief Dale Bosworth acknowledged that unmanaged recreation, especially off-road vehicle use, was one of the four greatest threats facing the National Forests. Beginning with Kraig and Jasper’s vision that day in the Ottawa, our own group had played a critical role in raising awareness of road and off-road vehicle issues on the national stage. . . . . of interconnected roadless wildlands . . . .

1998 Wildlands CPR files a Freedom of Information Act request with all 151 national forests regarding their management of off-road vehicles. In 1999 the results were catalogued into a web-based searchable database, and synthesized into a report: “Roaring from the Past.”

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1998 Congress reauthorizes the Symms Act as the Recreational Trails Program and gradually scales appropriations for trail development up to $50 million per year.

Photo courtesy of Bureau of Land Management.

As we reached our goals of raising awareness, Wildlands CPR set off in some new directions, leading campaigns and expanding our scope well beyond the group’s beginnings as an information clearinghouse. We took part in precedent-setting litigation; we helped create a national coalition to address motorized recreation problems; we initiated research on the economic benefits of road removal and restoration; we grew.

Fall 1998 Wildlands CPR co-sponsors, with Friends of the Earth, national offroad vehicle organizing meeting with more than 50 attendees, from over 40 organizations. Sets the stage for developing our future off-road vehicle work.

January 1999 Wildlands CPR and the Coalition for Canyon Preservation win a federal lawsuit to stop a parking lot expansion in Glacier National Park.

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When a nonprofit grows, there is always the danger that it will stray from its original vision. Sometimes this is appropriate; sometimes it is symptomatic of pressures that move us away from principle and too much toward political compromise. Ten years after its emergence, Wildlands CPR continues to raise awareness of the damage done by roads and motorized recreation. As it trains activists and supports restoration, it has earned respect for its leadership and its effectiveness at advancing its goals. We cofounders hope in addition that it will always speak out strongly for principles of ecological integrity and respect, and always hold these principles as more important than political expedience. The world continues to need strong voices speaking out on behalf of quiet, unadulterated wilderness, on behalf of vast, unroaded wildlands, on behalf of restoration. We hope these strong voices will point out the ongoing war against nature, and counter the insidious battlefronts initiated by even the highest levels of our government today. We also hope people will hear and understand two important messages, principles on which this group’s original vision was based: first, that healthy unbroken ecosystems are the very basis for human survival; and second, that the more-than-human world has an inherent right to exist, and we have a moral imperative to respect and defend that right.

Wildlands CPR is on the front edge of the advocation and planning for the removal of many of the old unused logging roads which web the mountains of the west. This restoration will be excellent for our economy, the land and its wildlife, and means good paying jobs for our skilled laborers. Wildlands CPR’s Restoration Program parallels the transition in our Rocky Mountain economy as it moves from extraction to renewal. — Pat Williams Pat Williams, a Montana Representative for 18 years, introduced 16 statewide Wilderness bills during his tenure. He now teaches at the University of Montana, and is a Senior Fellow and Regional Policy associate fellow at the O’Connor Center for the Rocky Mountain West.

August 1999 Wildlands CPR launches Skid Marks, our mostly “bi-weekly” electronic newsletter about offroad vehicle and road news.

1999 High Plains Films releases “Motor,” by Joe DeFelice. Assisted by Wildlands CPR, Joe developed this excellent video about the impacts of off-road vehicle recreation.

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

Photo courtesy of Bureau of Land Management, Uncompahgre District, Colorado.

That’s why we think this organization has survived and flourished from its beginning in a box, why the seeds we planted sprouted and grew: more than ever, we need strong and principled voices to speak up, to speak truth, and to defend and restore unbroken wilderness. In ten more years, we hope to see Wildlands CPR playing that role more strongly and powerfully than ever. And we hope to see, emerging on the ground, more of what we continue to envision: a tapestry of interconnected roadless wildlands across North America. — Katie Alvord is the author of Divorce Your Car! Ending the Love Affair with the Automobile (2000, New Society Publishers, www.newsociety.com). In 1994, she and Kraig Klungness cofounded the group now known as Wildlands CPR.

December 1999 Wildlands CPR leads the effort to develop comprehensive off-road vehicle petition for rule-making to the Forest Service. 106 other organizations join the petition.

February 2000 Wildlands CPR funds the bulk of a special section on the ecological effects of roads, published in the journal Conservation Biology.

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February 2000 Wildlands CPR hosts a meeting in Washington DC to start a national coalition to fight off-road vehicles. The Natural Trails and Waters Coalition is formed and in April, hosts its first lobby week and national conference in Washington DC. More than 90 activists attend from around the country.

2000 Wildlands CPR co-founder, Katie Alvord, publishes her book: Divorce your Car! Ending the love affair with the automobile.

2001 Wildlands CPR co-hosts the first restoration summit in Boulder, CO. Nearly 100 activists and forest practitioners attend.

2001 Forest Service finalizes roadless area protection rule and new national road management strategy. The road management strategy calls for the removal of between 146,000 and 186,000 miles of roads over the next 20-40 years.

Wildlands CPR and the

Photo courtesy of Bureau of Land Management.

Natural Trails and Waters Coalition

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hough off-road vehicle use expanded exponentially in the 1990s, the conservation community wasn’t quite ready to take on the issue. Beginning in 1997, Wildlands CPR devoted one of the nation’s first fulltime staff positions to addressing the impacts and abuses caused by off-road vehicle use on public lands; by 1999 we realized we had to expand our reach and bring more national attention to the issues. After many (small and large) strategy sessions with activists from around the country, Wildlands CPR spearheaded a national effort to pressure the Forest Service to overhaul their managment of ORVs. With support from The Wilderness Society, we developed a comprehensive rule-making petition and gathered more than 100 signers from conservation, recreation and sporting groups. We submitted the petition in December 1999, and a few

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months later set out to create a national coalition to address off-road vehicle problems and counter the media and lobbying efforts of the off-road vehicle industry. After a national meeting supported by several key foundations, The Natural Trails and Waters Coalition (NTWC, or “the Coalition”) was born. In addition to Wildlands CPR and The Wilderness Society, founding member organizations included American Lands Alliance, Bluewater Network, Friends of the Earth, Sierra Club and Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance. Coalition members recognized that motorized recreation — terrestrial and aquatic — was fast becoming one of the foremost threats to natural resources and social values on public lands. NTWC’s mission is to protect and restore public lands and waters from the damage caused by dirt bikes, jet

skis and other off-road vehicles. To achieve this mission, the Coalition uses legislative, legal, media, and grassroots strategies targeted at those who manage or make policy for state and federal public lands. NTWC is directed by a steering committee made up of the aforementioned groups, with one exception — Friends of the Earth has moved on to other projects and the Colorado Mountain Club has joined us. TWS and Wildlands CPR co-chair the steering committee. During its first year, the Coalition focused on media, message development, and national parks. For example, we supported a media campaign opposing jet skis in Kachemak Bay (Alaska), promoted a plan to control off-road vehicles on the White River National Forest in Colorado, and assisted with a statewide effort to control off-road vehicles in Minnesota. We also developed message templates, held focus groups

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2001 BLM undertakes a national assessment of their off-road vehicle management, but makes no significant changes.

2001 Forest Service road removal funding peaks and then drops by 55% the following year.

2001 Wildlands CPR contracts with Watershed Consulting to assess the Clearwater National Forest’s road removal program and to critique the Forest Service’s new national Roads Analysis Process.

and conducted opinion polls on the public perception of off-road vehicles. The results were not surprising: if people don’t use off-road vehicles, they pretty much don’t like them. Our work on national parks spanned the country, from proposed snowmobile expansions in Denali (Alaska) and Yellowstone National Parks (MT/WY), to swamp buggy impacts in Big Cypress National Preserve in Florida. We also supported the Bluewater Network’s efforts to control jet ski use in the parks. Snowmobiling in Yellowstone has been the subject of multiple legislative and legal fights and its fate remains unclear, even today. On the other hand, proposals to expand snowmobiling into the wilderness core of Denali never gained any ground, and in Florida, we and our partners took a big step forward when a magistrate’s decision upheld the Park Service’s plan to curtail ORV use. While we still await

2002 Wildlands CPR board member and longtime road warrior Dave Havlick publishes his book: No Place Distant: Roads and Motorized Recreation on America’s Public Lands.

June 2002 Wildlands CPR begins its science program, expanding our knowledge about the ecological impacts of roads and off-road vehicles, and building a field of researchers dedicated to learning more about the benefits of road removal as a form of restoration.

My wife and I are firm supporters of Wildlands CPR. They waste no money on frills, instead spending our gift dollars gathering facts and “ground truthing” what is happening on our public lands better than any other outfit — governmental or nonprofit — around. And most important, they have smart leadership that, while committed, also understands how, to be successful, we have to work within a changing cultural-political world. — Tom and Susan Roy

the final court ruling, the plan would limit off-road vehicles to 400 miles of designated routes (from the current 23,000 miles that users carved into the wetlands with no planning or analysis). While the national parks offered us an important media and policy wedge for exposing the problems with off-road vehicles, we knew that we would have to put some serious effort into both the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management, where off-road vehicle problems are exponentially larger than those in the parks. So NTWC partnered with the Wilderness Society to develop a guide to addressing off-road vehicle management on BLM lands, and in 2003 the Coalition hired a dedicated staff Photo by Jerry Sintz, Wyoming State Office, Bureau of Land Management.

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August 2002 Natural Trails and Waters Coalition publishes “ATV Safety Crisis: America’s Children at Risk.”

March 2003 The “Restoration Principles” are published in the journal Ecological Restoration. Wildlands CPR’s Marnie Criley is a co-author.

July 2003 Hells Canyon National Recreation Area releases their new comprehensive management plan, calling for the closure of 200 miles of roads.

2003 Forest Service Chief Dale Bosworth states that unmanaged recreation is one of the four greatest threats facing the national forests.

September 2003 Wildlands CPR publishes “Investing in Communities, Investing in the Land,” the first national economics assessment of the job creation potential of a national road removal program.

Photo courtesy of Bureau of Land Management, Four Rivers District, Idaho.

person to work on BLM issues. 2003 was also the year our Forest Service work came full circle: the petition for rule-making that launched NTWC in 1999 came back to the forefront this winter when the Forest Service announced they would re-write their national off-road vehicle rules. Wildlands CPR and NTWC quickly developed a national campaign plan to address this rule-making process, and Wildlands CPR hired ten regional leaders to organize in each region of the Forest Service (except Alaska). The rule-making process is still in progress. The Coalition will also use Wildlands CPR’s Travel Planning Primer to ensure that any new rule is implemented in the most effective way. In 2001 Wildlands CPR started a mini-grant program for off-road vehicle work. Our first grant, of $5,000, went to the Florida Biodiversity Project for

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their work in Big Cypress National Preserve. After distributing nearly $20,000, we turned the program over to NTWC, which has since awarded more than $100,000 in mini-grants for everything from monitoring programs, to legal battles, to scientific research, to outreach and media. The results have been amazing, with activists expanding off-road vehicle work in every region of the country. Examples of successful NTWC mini-grants include: • In Washington State, the Issaquah Alps Trails Club used a $5000 grant from NTWC to dramatically improve the allocation of gas tax funds for recreational uses. The mini-grant was combined with other funding to support lobbying and education of state officials in Olympia, and outreach to environmental and recreational groups.

• In California, NTWC helped CORE (Commitment to Our Recreational Environment) with materials and support to get the Stanislaus Forest to pay attention and write a fair travel plan after six years of ignoring recreationists and adjoining private property owners. • In Utah, a mini-grant enabled the Great Old Broads for Wilderness to increase monitoring of BLM lands and create a state-of-the-art database on offroad vehicle impacts in the West. • In Montana, an NTWC mini-grant helped the Predator Conservation Alliance produce a video for distribution to the general public: “Backcountry Travel, the Question of Multiple Use on our Public Lands.” These are just a few of the projects we’ve supported, helping grassroots organizations fight the impacts of ORVs across the country.

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

October 2003 Wildlands CPR and the Sierra Club fund the removal of 2.5 miles of roads adjacent to the Anaconda Pintler Wilderness, on the BeaverheadDeerlodge National Forest in Montana.

January 2004 The journal Frontiers in Ecology publishes “Benefits and Impacts of Road Removal.” Wildlands CPR staff scientist Adam Switalski is the lead author on the article.

It is refreshing to work with Wildlands CPR because they have an real hands on approach to restoration issues and are genuine in understanding and support of those who work in the woods. Because they have technical expertise in restoring degraded road systems they bring practical perspective and credible information to the discussion of policies related to roads on our public lands. Plus, they are fun people to be around and work with. — Maia Enzer, Sustainable Northwest

January 2004 The Forest Service announces a national process to overhaul their offroad vehicle rules; the proposed rule is released in July.

April 2004 Wildlands CPR co-hosts a workshop with the Clearwater National Forest on developing effective road removal programs; more than 40 Forest Service employees attend. Wildlands CPR releases several new resources including a guide to road removal funding and a report highlighting model road removal programs.

July 2004 The Forest Service announces a proposed new rule to remove protections for roadless areas and to rewrite the Roadless Rule.

In 2002, NTWC worked with the Consumer Federation of America to release a report on the safety risks posed by off-road vehicles. The report, “ATV Safety Crisis: America’s Children At Risk,” was a landmark report on the continuing safety problems with off-road vehicles. The manufacture and sale of three-wheeled off-road vehicles was banned in the late 1980s after numerous studies showed their inherent instability. Four wheelers were assumed to be more stable, but the Coalition’s report showed that fatalities and serious injuries are nearly as problematic as before, especially for children. One year later the Coalition issued a follow-up report; both have generated significant media attention. In addition, numerous states are considering changes to their licensing laws regarding children and off-road vehicles, though no new legislation has been passed yet. When Wildlands CPR and others created the Natural Trails and Waters Coalition, we did so to raise awareness about the profound impacts off-road vehicle recreation has on our public lands, and to change management to protect and restore lands from these impacts. We’ve been extraordinarily successful: we’ve helped stop bad legislation; we’ve promoted good legislation; we’ve developed additional tools; and we’ve assisted grassroots groups by infusing small but critical amounts of funding for expanding their off-road vehicle work. The Coalition works with people from all walks of life, including hunters, hikers, horseback riders, ranchers, private property owners, and, yes, conservationists! It’s been exciting to see so many different people, with so many different backgrounds, get so riled up and active on one issue. However, off road vehicle riders are often in the majority at public meetings and by nature are louder than non-motorized forest visitors. “Quiet” forest visitors will often choose to leave a favorite hiking or hunting area rather than face an uncomfortable and potentially dangerous conflict with an off-road vehicle.

Photo by Paul Happel, Bureau of Land Management, Roswell, New Mexico.

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

Wildlands CPR is proud to have been a founding member of the Natural Trails and Waters Coalition. Through this partnership we’ve already changed the way off-road vehicle recreation is perceived in the U.S. Over the next few years we will continue to work together to develop local, vocal, active networks of people working to protect public lands from off-road vehicle impacts.

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I

n honor of our tenth anniversary, we’ve been busy sprucing things up around the Wildlands CPR office and website. The first thing you may have noticed is our new logo! It took us several months but we finally found something we like, and we hope you do too. Many thanks to Mark Alan Wilson for the concept, and to Hank Green for making it work. Thanks also to Beth Peluso for many excellent ideas. A second thank you goes to Mark Alan Wilson, Chuck Irestone and our own Kiffin Hope for revamping our website. We added new materials, fact sheets and other non-technical

information, in addition to cleaning up and reorganizing our technical resources and others to come are just a click away from the activist resources page. While we’ve been busy refreshing our look, we also received a number of generous grants during the past few months. Many thanks to the Flintridge Foundation for a twoyear grant for our restoration work, and to the Wilburforce, Lazar, Maki, and Weeden Foundations. And thanks to those of you who responded to our tenth anniversary mailing, we really appreciate your continuing support!

Ten Years of Clearinghouse Assistance Information requests

Wildlands CPR responds to an average of 500 information requests per year — roughly 5,000 since our inception. Requests include anything from bibliographic searches to strategy consultations; many people also access our resources directly on line.

Bibliographic database

In 1995, Reed Noss oversaw development of a bibliographic database on the ecological effects of roads and motorized recreation. We’ve updated the database every other year, and it now contains more than 10,000 citations. It’s been used by activists and land managers throughout the U.S., including nearly every federal agency that manages land (e.g. Park Service, Environmental Protection Agency, Bureau of Indian Affairs). Researchers from Australia, Brazil, Canada, England, Germany, Indonesia, Israel, New Zealand, Pakistan, Sweden, The Netherlands, and many other countries have also used the database — it is one of the largest collections of road and off-road vehicle information in the world.

Minnesota, Montana, North Carolina, South Carolina, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Washington (we’ve held multiple workshops in many of these states).

Presentations, conferences and research

Wildlands CPR staff members have given hundreds of presentations to thousands of people at conferences and workshops throughout the U.S. In addition, we’ve raised and distributed nearly $100,000 for original research on road removal.

Litigation

Wildlands CPR has been involved in about 20 lawsuits, ranging from intervening on behalf of the Forest Service against the timber industry or off-road vehicle users, to suing to stop roads and motorized recreation. We’ve won all but two of our cases, upholding many road and route closures and preventing new construction.

Workshops

Since our workshop program began in 1995, Wildlands CPR has trained nearly 1000 activists and agency employees to: 1) monitor and inventory system and non-system roads and motorized routes; 2) prevent new road construction; and 3) understand and promote road removal. We’ve sponsored workshops in Alabama, Alaska, Alberta (Canada), Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan,

Summer 2004 Wildlands CPR begins the first of two field studies on the ecological effects of road removal, one in the Flathead National Forest in Montana.

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2004 Wildlands CPR celebrates its 10th Anniversary!

The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

Join Wildlands CPR Today!

We’ve made joining Wildlands CPR easier — and more effective — than ever before. In honor of our 10th anniversary, please consider pledging $10/month!

Consider the advantages of our Monthly Giving Program • Reducing Overhead

• Making Your Gift Easier

Monthly giving puts your contribution directly into action and reduces our administrative costs. The savings go to restoring wildlands and building a more effective network.

Say goodbye to renewal letters! Your credit card or bank statement will contain a record of each gift; we will also send a year-end tax receipt for your records.

• Our Promise To You You maintain complete control over your donation. To change or cancel your gift at any time, just write or give us a call.

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The Road-RIPorter, Autumn Equinox 2004

Please send this form and your payment option to: Wildlands CPR • P.O. Box 7516 • Missoula, Montana 59807

Thank you for your support! 23

Photo by Marcel Huijser.

Non-profit Organization US POSTAGE PAID MISSOULA MT, 59801 PERMIT NO. 569

Wildlands CPR is widely recognized and utilized as the expert source on critical road and motorized recreation science and policy. — Taylor McKinnon, Grand Canyon Trust

The Road-RIPorter is printed on 100% post-consumer recycled, process chlorine-free bleached paper with soy-based ink.