Editorial: Find site that welcomes ATVs

Opponents of an all-terrain vehicle park slated for a Monroe Township tract are likely cheered by report that the state Department of Environmental Protection is now scouting elsewhere for a South Jersey site where riders could kick up the dust legally.

Unfortunately, the DEP is probably ready to ride off into the sunset with a $1.2 million bill to taxpayers for buying the 212-acre former sand mine, with the intent of developing the ATV park, in 2005.

Back then, we questioned what business the DEP has in trying to put up a noisy, gasoline-fume-emitting, dust-producing, truck-traffic-generating facility in the environmentally sensitive Pinelands, no less when its job is to control pollution, not create it. We still don't understand it.

We do, however, understand that there are few places where these off-road vehicles can be operated legally. And, having spent good money on ATVs, riders will run rampant through farm fields and residential areas unless provided with someplace where they can play legally.

Now, the DEP is apparently obligated to develop three ATV parks one each in the northern, central and southern parts of the state as a condition of a long-overdue law that requires a registration fee and license program for these vehicles.

At least the DEP now acknowledges the long-standing resistance to the Monroe site, some of which stemmed from the state's belief that it could short-circuit local planning requirements. At one contentious meeting a few years ago, more than 200 Jackson Road neighbors and others voiced complaints. Eventually, the DEP agreed to apply to the planning board.

Really, ATV parks should be built and operated commercially or by non-profit groups, like a riding club or a dealers' trade group. But if the DEP must design and build ATV parks, the things should go where they're wanted.

Such seems to be the case with a potential ATV site in Little Egg Harbor Township, Ocean County, which has had a non-profit backer and some support from local officials from the start. If the DEP wants a site farther south, what about Cumberland County, where there is a burgeoning motorsports industry already?

The DEP should declare the Monroe site dead, and find another good, less-intensive use for the $1.2 million hole in the ground that it purchased with taxpayers' money.

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Source: http://www.nj.com/gloucester/index.ssf?/base/news-1/1264575310227830.xml&coll=8

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