Trump order increases motor vehicle access on public land
Laura Lundquist
(Missoula Current) The Trump administration has rescinded historical orders that limited motorized vehicle use on public lands, which could have negative implications for other users of national forests, lands and parks.
On Friday evening, shortly after offices closed at 5 p.m. on the West Coast, the White House Office of Communications posted a new executive order titled “Removing Unnecessary and Counterproductive Restrictions on Access to Federal Lands.” The order rescinds two previous executive orders from the 1970s that limited off-road vehicle use on federal lands.
Trump’s order called the two previous orders - one issued by President Richard M. Nixon - “excessive regulation” because existing laws and agency authority “provide the appropriate framework for managing off-road vehicle use on Federal lands.”
An accompanying fact sheet added that the old executive orders created “unnecessary barriers to recreation, energy and timber production, access to remote areas, and infrastructure maintenance.”
“Rescinding Executive Order 11644 and Executive Order 11989 would facilitate the replacement of current regulations with a system for off-road vehicle use designation that provides more access, recreational opportunities, and greater multiple use benefits to the public,” according to Trump’s executive order.
Executive Order 11644, issued by Nixon in 1972, said federal land agencies had to develop regulations to evaluate where off-road vehicles were allowed based upon “minimization criteria.” Those criteria sought to minimize vehicle damage to soils, vegetation, water, and wildlife and wildlife habitat. Regulations were also required to minimize conflict between off-road vehicles and other public uses.
When Nixon issued his order, off-road vehicles consisted mainly of dirt bikes and maybe a few early-generation ATVs and snowmobiles. It was nothing like the explosion of off-road vehicles that exists today, with the addition of electric dirt bikes, bigger ATV’s and UTV’s, and side-by-sides that are as big as a small SUV. The old snowmobiles of the 1970s have been replaced by higher-powered snowmobiles and snowbikes.
Off-road vehicles can damage public lands, particularly in popular areas where high use can take a toll. As a result, President Jimmy Carter signed Executive Order 11989 in 1977 to allow agencies to immediately close areas to off-road vehicles if they were found to be causing environmental damage.
Together, the two orders provided the framework that agencies use to develop travel management plans on national forests and Bureau of Land Management areas, although it took more than 25 years for the travel management rule to be finalized under the George W. Bush administration. These plans seek to balance public access with conservation by identifying which roads, trails and areas can be open to vehicles and which are closed to protect natural resources, wildlife habitats, and cultural sites.
Now, Trump’s executive order makes it so that agencies don’t have to use the minimization criteria to evaluate off-road use. Some public land watchdogs expect the U.S. Forest Service and the BLM to announce rule-making processes to change their travel management rules and plans or rescind them entirely.
The Blue Ribbon Coalition, a coalition of motorized vehicle groups, celebrated Trump’s executive order in a social media post, saying Nixon’s order has been used for 50 years to shut down recreational vehicle access to public lands so they’ve been fighting it for years. One Voice Coalition also claimed credit for pushing the effort through.
“We’ve been saying all along that the minimization criteria were created out of thin air. There was no statutory basis in the law for them. It was just these two executive orders,” said Ben Burr, Blue Ribbon Coalition director in a video post.
In Montana, some hunters weren’t too happy, complaining in online forums that vehicle traffic displaces big game. Wildlife advocates cautioned that increased vehicle use could negatively affect many Montana species that are already suffering from increasing human pressure.
“Removing or weakening regulations for properly managing motorized recreation will endanger at-risk fish and wildlife, particularly grizzly bears and bull trout, because off-road vehicles choke streams with dirt and damage sensitive habitats,” said Adam Rissien, rewilding manager with WildEarth Guardians. “Today’s off-road vehicles are even more powerful, more damaging than when the first orders were put in place to protect public lands from unfettered motorized recreation, and removing long-standing protections will only make matters worse.”
Nixon’s executive order also limited vehicles in national parks. So when Utah's two U.S. senators, Mike Lee and John Curtis, introduced legislation last fall that would open up Capitol Reef National Park, and possibly other units of the National Park System, to off-road vehicles, people didn’t take it too seriously. Now they’re worried.
“The reality is that there are tens of thousands of miles of dirt roads and trails in Utah’s canyon country open today to motorized vehicles. Far from motorized vehicles being kept out of public lands, it’s quite the opposite: it’s the wildlife and visitors trying to picnic or camp with their families that are being chased out at every turn,” said Steve Bloch, Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance legal director in a release.
“These executive orders provided the foundation for common-sense management of motorized vehicles on public lands. They recognized the destructive impact unmanaged motor vehicles have on our public lands and required federal agencies to minimize the damage. The impacts of (Trump’s) Order will be significant, long-lasting, and devastating.”
Contact reporter Laura Lundquist at lundquist@missoulacurrent.com.