POLICY SUMMARY:
trails
Home
About the FWOC
Join the FWOC
Member Organizations
Adopted Resolutions
Outdoors West
Officers
Current List of Conservation Developments with Bush Administration
History
Policy Summary
Convention Schedule
Related Links
Site Map
FEDERATION OF WESTERN OUTDOOR CLUBS
next >>
General
Hiking trails should be protected from being disrupted by clear cuts, slash and other activities that impact established trails. [Res. 2, 1990]
Funding should be increased for trail construction and maintenance, and funding for construction of roads on national forests should be reduced. [Res. 1, 1990]
Clubs should be encouraged to work with land management agencies to provide volunteer labor to maintain trails properly so that they are safe, accessible and enjoyable. [Res. 5, 1990]
Programs similar to the original Civilian Conservation Corps should be revived to address needed work to maintain public trails, improve recreational facilities, and repair damage to the environment. [Res. 7, 1991] Such programs will also provide useful social benefits through alleviating unemployment among youth. [Res. 18, 1992, [Res. 8, 1994]
Legislation should not be enacted that would earmark gas taxes and other user fees for trail improvement under arrangements that would put control in hands of motorized users. [Res. 3, 1990] A more balanced approach is needed to provide funding for trail maintenance and construction. [Res. 20, 1991]
A portion of the funds derived from fees levied by the Forest Service for parking at trailheads should be used to establish a trailhead security program to protect vehicles parked at such sites from vandalism and break-ins. Such a program should provide surveillance, enforcement patrols, as well as user education (signs and hand outs). [Res. 6, 1997]
Wilderness areas and de facto areas of wilderness must be closed to wheeled vehicles, [Res. 3, 1990], including bicycles on mountain trails. [Res. 23, 1995]
SUPERSEDED. No use of trails in national forests by offroad vehicles ought to be allowed because they disturb people and wildlife (e.g., noise, air pollution, etc.). Their use ought to be confined to roads. Trail use ought to be reserved for such non-motorized uses as hiking, cross-country skiing, and horseback riding. [Res. 6, 2000]
On public lands offroad vehicles should be confined to designated roads and routes, or other locations which will not contribute to or cause any adverse environmental impacts [Res. 10, 2002] Agencies that maintain public lands should develop regulations to implement such provisions and should see that they are enforced. Maps should be issued to show routes that are open and closed. [Res. 18, 2003]
The Forest Service's program to inventory its roads and trails and to designate which will be open to use by off-road vehicles, and which will not, should draw support and go forward, including a ban on cross-coruntry vehicles. Routes where adverse environmental impacts will occur should be closed to ORV use. [Res. 12, 2005]
Public land management agencies, especially the Forest Service and the BLM, need to promote understanding by the public of the problem of unmanaged use of these lands by off-road vehicles, including ATV's, dirt bikes, and other ORVs. They need to oversee and enforce rules governing the proper use of public lands by ORVs. The new rule proposed by the Forest Service in July 2004, while a step forward, falls short of what is needed to address this problem because it has no timeline for implementation and will only come into force as forest plans are revised to designate roads and routes open and closed to vehicles. [Res. 15, 2004]
Those who use off-road vehicles should be required to get training and licenses. Standards should be set that would encourage greater responsibility among those who advertise and sell such vehicles. Trails degraded by their use should be restored. [Res. 10, 2002]
Regulation of trail use by mountain bikes (outside of wilderness) could be better enforced if licenses were required on all such bikes, showing the users' license number in large type on the front and back of the bike--making it possible to identify violators and making riders accountable. States such as California should undertake this role. [Res. 9, 1997] Such license plates should also be required for ATVs, and the numbers should be large enough to be readable by others; this will make it easier for others to report offenders who break regulations and do damage. [Res. 4, 2008]
The National Park Service should continue to maintain the wilderness characteristics of zones within its holdings that Congress is considering for inclusion within the National Wilderness Preservation System. In pursuance of this responsibility, the Park Service should not allow use of such areas by mountain bikes. The Wilderness Act not only prohibits motor vehicles, it also prohibits all forms of mechanical transport, which includes mountain bikes. [Res. 20, 2005]
Nature trails should be established in cities and counties, as well as regional networks of nature trails. [Res. 4, 1990] However, the development and funding of these trails should not come at the expense of funding for trails in non-urban areas (as on national forests). [Res. 8, 1991]
Federal and state trail plans should use the latest geographical information system technology in a consistent way that links with adjacent jurisdictions. [Res. 6, 1991]
Specific Trails
The state government in California should move ahead to fund and develop a trail along its entire coastline, linking existing trails through protected areas of various jurisdictions. [Res. 3, 1991]Where protection is not otherwise provided, a nature corridor should be established along the Pacific Crest Trail so as to disallow clear-cutting within one half mile and any logging whatsoever within 150 feet of it. [Res. 5, 1991]
The Forest Service needs to control increasing use of the backcountry in inappropriate ways by snowmobiles, especially in the Sierra Nevada, by (1) taking effective action to keep snowmobiles from intruding into designated wilderness areas; (2) confining snow-mobles to designated areas and trails; and (3) keeping approved routes and areas from extending to wilderness boundaries where intrusions into wilderness are occurring. [Res. 16, 2004]
The El Dorado National Forest in the Sierra should adopt a plan for its trails, and vehicular and off-road vehicular use, that provides a high level of protection for forest resources (as in EIS alternative E) prohibits cross-country travel be wheeled motor vehicles, closes trails and native system roads during the winter, and prevents double parking along roads. Other national forests should adopt similar plans. [Res. 10, 2007]
A wide, undisturbed buffer, which is sufficient to protect trail esthetics, should be provided along all existing trails, with adequate enforcement. All public agencies, federal and state, should provide and protect these buffers. [Res. 25, 1999]
Congress should treat the Pacific Crest Trail as a single unit in providing appropriated funding to maintain it (just as with the Appalachian Trail). [Res. 10, 1991]
A carefully constructed foot trail should replace what had been a road in Jarbidge Canyon in northeast Nevada from the Pine Creek Campground to the boundary of the Jarbidge Wilderness so as to avoid any adverse impact upon the habitat of the threatened bull trout. [Res. 18, 2000]
Segments of the Chinook Trail, which is designed to provide a rimtop loop trail around the Columbia Gorge in Oregon and Washington states, should be given status (as appropriate) as either National Scenic, Recreational or Historic Trails (so as to match the National Scenic Status given the Gorge itself). [Res. 24, 1999]
The Chinook Trail should be extended from Bluff Mountain in order to provide a connection with the Pacific Crest Trail. The work should be done through a partnership between the Forest Service and the Chinook Trail Association in the state of Washington. [Res. 7, 2005]
A 30-mile long trail should be built along the Chelatchie Prairie road in Washington state connecting Yacolt and Battleground with Vancouver, and which will connect the Columbia River lowlands with the foothills of the Cascades. It should be incorporated in the Clark County trail master plan. [Res. 8, 2005]
A nonmotorized water trail should be established along 146 miles of the Columbia River from Bonneville Dam to the Pacific Ocean. Campsites along it should be reserved for those using nonmotorized watercraft. It would create the experience of Lewis and Clark. [Res. 25, 2003]
next >>