Recent comments

It sends a good message and hopefully it will help by decreasing the amount of garbage at the parks.

George,
If education means: do as we've always done because that's the way we like it, I ain't learning. :)

Not San Francisco Maritime Historical Park.

Great article - I love this program. The TRACK trail sign with the kids in it is Claytor Lake State Park in VA. Look for more TRACKS in Virginia State Parks soon!

Good job, tomp2.

Boy, until I became a regular here at Traveler, I never knew that bicycles were another topic like circumcision, abortion, and long form birth certificates to avoid discussing due to the unending and unresolving arguments. Amazing.

Followup to George,

I meant to answer your question about something that's mechanical but not banned in the NPS and Forest Service regulations. I can think of two things. (1) unicycles (don't laugh; take a look at YouTube for amazing videos of mountain unicyclists traversing rugged terrain and descending steep trails that a hiker would be challenged to walk down). (2) pedal-driven kayaks (they have been commercially available, but I don't know if people use them).

Also, you said that you're a ranger in an area that is now Wilderness. Did mountain bikers lose access to trails there when it became a Wilderness? Or were the trails always unappealing to cyclists? Or are there no trails, as is true of some Wildernesses (e.g., the Sanhedrin in northern California)? If they did, did they do anything to try to preserve access? Do they ride them against the regulations even now? Again, just curious. I live in urban America and have no way of getting a sense of such things.

George,

You're right that we don't agree (at least not entirely), but I think you've made an excellent argument for your point of view—one that many obviously share. I appreciate your taking the time to answer.

Very few things in the law are certain, and whether bikes are allowed in Wilderness is not among those few things. Good legal arguments can be made on both sides. However, the fact that there's this debate is significant. Ten years ago, almost everyone accepted that the Wilderness Act banned bicycles because it prohibits "mechanical transport," and the debate ended there. Because it's become uncertain since about 2005, the debate has shifted to policy, a much more fruitful area for discussion, as the second part of your reply illustrates.

You mention that you're a ranger and that you and your colleagues have issued very few citations to cyclists in Wilderness. Is that because there is so much Wilderness and so few visitors that the chances of encountering anyone in the average Wilderness (let alone someone on a bicycle) are slim?

I know that the Desolation Wilderness in California is heavily used, and I hear that the Maroon Bells south of Aspen, Colo., are so impacted in the summer that private cars aren't allowed at trailheads anymore—you have to take a bus. But I have the impression that a great number of Wilderness areas hardly receive any human visitation. You must know the answer to this, or at least have an idea. I'd be curious to know, since I doubt I'll see even 1% of Wilderness areas during my lifetime.

Well said Anon 3, but you can increase the oceanfront rentals to more than 5K and upwards of 12K.
I am not standing on the ORV realm only I know for a fact that most vehicle free areas are inaccessable to pedestrians until they build new access areas. I also know this will not happen any time soon because of the same rules that implemented the closures in the first place and also prevent a safe crossing from being built in place of a outdated bridge...
Name the reasons people attend the beaches of Cape Hatteras and then compare those to the new rules applied this month. Mine are listed below...
1) Peace and Quiet: Cape Hatteras was the one place I could go and relax without thousands of beach towels surrounding me. Now the ORV areas are going to be Overcrowded worse than before because they are all pushed into smaller areas.
2) Family Fun: I could bring my kids out to a secluded beach and relax without worries of them disrupting others. Now I will either have to trudge through 100+ degree sand for up to a 1/4 mile with two kids, a cooler, and towels just to get to the beach and god forbid if there were an emergency and I had to get them out asap!!!!
3) My Dog... Well unless I want to subject my animal to being strapped to a six foot leash the entire time he has made his last trip down.
There are millions of reasons why I love Cape Hatteras, but with added restrictions we will probably reduce our footprint there from 8+ trips a year to maybe one.
Please do not let people tell you this is only about ORV's... All people are being restricted from going to many of the areas of Cape Hatteras. If you do not believe me try walking out to Cape Point in the summer... Please let us know how much your ticket is.

imtnbike:

I dunno. To me and, apparently the NPS & USFS, "mechanical
transport" means no bicycles. Seems like they could have said
"motorized" or, hmmm, "fossil fuel powered" and made it
clear that human powered was OK. I can't think of any other type of transport
that's allowed that falls into a gray area. It's either foot or on top of
something with hoofs – clearly neither are mechanical. Is there something else
in that broad category that's allowed and would weaken the case? (with the
possible exception of wheelchairs under ADA).

However wobbly you want to present it, it is law and shows no sign of being
overturned or changed – not really all that wobbly… . My main experience
is as a ranger in an area now Wilderness. And I cheerfully admit I'm not
familiar with the history of how bikes were banned, but in the western parks
I'm familiar with, bikes have never been allowed past paved roads in the 40+
years of my career. No citation that either myself or my colleagues have given
for a bike in Wilderness (a very, very few) has ever been dismissed.

I definitely agree with you that most legislators don't want to touch it.
But I strongly disagree that bicycling or any other form of mechanical
transport is not a serious intrusion on wilderness character. All regulations
and court decisions derived from the Wilderness Act support a strict and
protective interpretation. Otherwise, what's the point? Why even have a
Wilderness Act if you're not going to try to preserve what we call wilderness.

Well, I'll take a stab at it, though it's pretty clear we're not going to
agree on this. Setting the premise of not allowing "personal
preferences" is kind of wobbly in itself but I'll soldier on with those
constraints! Our attitudes towards wilderness have been shaped by the history
of the conservation movement and are rooted in both the westward expansion and
the transcendentalism of Emerson, Thoreau & Muir.

They gave people a new way of looking at the land, different from the
resource-extractive and utilitarian attitudes of the 18th & 19th centuries.
Attitudes or, if I may, personal preferences changed. People began to value
places that appeared to be wild and untouched. By the early 20th century those
personal preferences were codified into laws -- the Organic Act for the
National Park Service as well as the creation of the Forest Service and reserves
for each.

Later in the 20th century, it became apparent that the few remaining wild
places were being destroyed at a frightening rate -- sub divisions, roads built
everywhere, inundated by dams. The environmental movement starting in the 60s
-- the personal preferences of a sizeable and vocal group of hippies,
conservationists such as Brower and Stegner and many others -- led to a second
great awakening: the creation of the Wilderness Act. Also the Environmental
Protection Act, Clean Water Act, Clean Air & etc. A very productive period.

Which led, alas, to banning bikes in National Parks and Wilderness areas in
general. The semi-bright line between hi-tech fabrics, GPS etc and bikes is the
level of intrusion on the experience that users feel when they encounter such
things while traveling. The phrase "mechanical transport" is not
random nor wobbly. Other stuff intrudes on wilderness – absolutely -- but so
far is tolerated by users. So it does, in fact, come down to personal
preferences to a great degree. It is exactly those preferences that directly
led to the laws as well as agency and court interpretations of those laws. In
that sense, they're inseparable.

I feel sorry for the child and family inolved in the attack, but I think people -- especially tourists not familiar with this area -- should remember that Big Bend National Park is huge, it's a NATIONAL PARK and not a fenced-in petting zoo. I read one account (in a newspaper) that the mother of the bitten boy essentially blamed the BBNP rangers for "letting" the attack happen. Get real! The rangers can't watch every inch and every acre of the park 24/7, and they can't -- or shouldn't -- fence in the Chisos Basin, its lodge and campgrounds. If you're going to camp in the park (whether a remote, back-country site or Rio Grande Village, etc.) you should expect to see wild critters including javalina, bobcats, raptors, rattlesnakes, spiders, scorpions, and possibly black bears and mountain lions. The mother of the bitten child appeared to think the park is a zoo and the animals should be contained. NO! It's a wild and scenic place, and it should remain so.