Right-wing contradictions with off-road vehicles

Written by Tucson Citizen

Monday, March 07, 2011

As a person who grew up in Marana near the Ironwood Forest National Monument, I know many of the backroads and washes in the area.

The road that goes out there also goes by a cemetery in an old ghost town where many in my family are resting forever. I appreciate the long day drives out in the desert, maybe a short hike, to get away from the city for awhile.

I also stay on the road rather than going off-road in an ATV or motorcycle. I know the rules and respect the historic land.

Yet you can always find and hear bikes out there with riders not obeying the law. I wonder what part of ILLEGAL is ILLEGAL they don’t understand?

Environmentalists in Arizona have identified more than 2 million acres of BLM lands that they believe should be eligible for protection under this policy. They include more than 35,000 acres in Ironwood Monument and more than 100,000 acres in the Sonoran Desert National Monument between Tucson and Phoenix.

They want to remove off-road vehicles from as much of this land as possible on the grounds that the vehicles are too noisy and destructive.

“This isn’t about grabbing new wilderness areas,”said Matt Skroch, director of the Arizona Wilderness Coalition. “It’s about protecting wilderness characteristics. It gives BLM management the flexibility to ensure that these areas have opportunities for solitude and non-motorized recreation.

“When a family goes out for a hike, or somebody decides to go on a backpack trip or somebody wants to go photograph spring wildflowers, the buzz and dust of off-road vehicles nearby degrades the public’s experience,” Skroch said.

Off-road-vehicle groups say they’ll fight efforts to close more lands to off-roaders when all areas in Ironwood not on designated roads already are closed to motor vehicles.

Chris Saxe, president of the Trail Riders of Southern Arizona, said closing routes to off-road vehicles will aggravate an existing problem with wildcat trails, because more riders will create and use them.

“I don’t understand why the federal government feels that closing land will solve any problem,” Saxe said.

Jeff Gursh, a spokesman for the Arizona Off-Highway Vehicle Coalition, added: “Please do not allow our public lands to become places to see in a museum, rather than visit in person.”

But the BLM’s top wilderness official in Arizona said the new policy will give all user groups more certainty about how wilderness characteristics will be considered in planning for its lands.

via Ironwood Monument will be 1st test of policy.

Here the US citizen is admitting that if the federal government sets up a rule that they do not agree with, in this case setting up a boundary as to where they can or cannot go, it is admitted that Americans might break the law and aggravate the problem.

Why should these humans be forbidden from traveling on land they used to have access to in the past, just because some government far away says that can’t?

Bikers didn’t cross the off-road boundaries, the off-road boundaries crossed them!

Illegal is illegal, that is, until you don’t agree with the law…

Source: http://tucsoncitizen.com/three-sonorans/2011/03/07/right-wing-contradictions-with-off-road-vehicles/

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Community Voices

“Once they chased our cow into a deep arroyo where it fell and broke its neck. I don't understand how anyone could think chasing livestock is fun.” As a result of the growing conflicts with off-roaders, the Gonzales family stopped their cattle ranching. It doesn't matter whether it is a plate or decal, what is important is that the identification is visible. The police could have tracked down the illegal riders if we had been able to photograph the IDs on their vehicles. I think that would have made them think twice before breaking the law.”

- Eleanor Gonzales, private property owner in Santé Fe County, NM