Mt. Hood National Forest on path to limit off-road vehicles

Matthew Preusch

The Mt. Hood National Forest is moving toward limiting off-road vehicles such as ATVs and dirt bikes to just a few select areas in the 1 million-acre forest east of Portland, dramatically curtailing their presence on the mountain.

Forest officials Thursday released a draft plan that would ban any cross-country travel by such machines, confining them to designated roads and trails to limit their environmental impact.

Like all national forests, Mt. Hood is creating a "travel management plan" to comply with a 2005 rule change by the U.S. Forest Service.

In the past, all areas in most forests, including Mt. Hood, were open to off-highway vehicles -- a category that includes motorcycles and Jeeps -- unless they were marked off-limits. Under the new rules, all areas are presumed off-limits unless specifically designated for off-highway vehicles.

The Mt. Hood forest has about 3,383 miles of roads in different states of repair, and the forest's two preferred plans released Thursday would limit off-road vehicles to 99 or 325 miles of roads and trails in select areas.

Over the past two years, the public and interest groups have weighed in on a more general plan the forest issued two years ago.

"We got lots of comment and interaction from the public," said Rick Acosta, a forest spokesman. Those comments led to the specific proposals put forward today.

ATV advocates are generally unhappy with the approach the Mt. Hood forest is taking, saying it will concentrate too many off-road users in too-small areas that aren't linked by connecting roads.

"I read through this thing and I thought, 'Good grief'," said Joni Mogstad of Eugene, treasurer for the Blue Ribbon Coalition, a national public lands access advocacy group.

Conservation groups take a more mixed view about what forest planners have come up with, generally supporting the option with the fewest miles of roads open to off-road vehicles.

"We do believe people have a right to use the forest, but we don't think it's right for people to be going into the backcountry and abusing it," said Amy Harwood of the Portland group Bark.

The public will get a chance to comment on those proposals at two public meetings: Sept. 15 at the University Place Hotel & Conference Center in Portland and Sept. 16 at the Hood River Inn in Hood River. Both open houses will be from 6 to 8:30 p.m.

The earliest a final plan would be released would be late this year, and it probably will be 2010 before a final decision is reached and implemented.

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Source: http://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2009/08/mt_hood_takes_first_steps_to_l.html

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