Summer Solstice 2009. Volume 14 No. 2

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wildlandscpr.org

Inside…

A Look Down the Trail, by BethanieWalder. Page 2Wildlands CPR Issues New Report onForest Service Road Management,by Greg Peters and Sarah Peters.Pages 3-5Policy Primer, by Vera Smith and SarahPeters. Pages 6-7Get with the Program: Restoration and Transportation Program Updates.Pages 8-9DePaving the Way: by Bethanie Walder.Pages 10-11Odes to Roads: The Spirit oRestoration, by Thomas R.Petersen. Pages 12-13Citizen Spotlight on Kim Erion, byCathrine Walters. Pages 14-15Biblio Notes: Mitigating the Impactso Roads as a Climate ChangeAdaptation Strategy, by AdamSwitalski and Liane Davis. Pages16-18Regional Reports & Updates. Page 19Field Notes, by Adam Switalski. Pages20-21Around the Ofce, Membership Ino.Pages 22-23

— story begins on page 3 —

Wildlands CPR Issues New Reporton Forest Service Road Management

By Greg Peters and Sarah Peters (no relation)

The state o National Forest System roads does not resemble an idyllic drive down a backcountry road. Rather, images o erosive damage are common, exacerbated by a chronic lack o maintenance. Photoscourtesy o Bureau o Land Management.

The Road-RIPorter, Summer Solstice 2009

Wildlands CPR revives and protects wild places by promoting watershed restoration that improves fsh and wildlie habitat, provides clean water, and enhances community economies. We ocus on reclaiming ecologically damaging, unneeded roads and stopping o-road vehicle abuse on public lands.

P.O. Box 7516Missoula, MT 59807(406) 543-9551 www.wildlandscpr.org

Director

Bethanie Walder

Development Director

Tom Petersen

Science Coordinator

Adam Switalski

Legal and Agency Liaison

Sarah Peters

Montana State ORV Coordinator

Adam Rissien

Utah State ORV Coordinator

Laurel Hagen

Restoration CampaignCoordinator

Sue Gunn

Program Associate

Cathrine L. Walters

Restoration Research Associate

Josh Hurd

Journal Editor

Dan Funsch

Interns & Volunteers

Greg Peters, Owen Weber, Stuart Smith

Board of Directors

Amy Atwood, Jim Furnish,William Geer, Chris Kassar, Rebecca Lloyd, Crystal Mario, Cara Nelson, Brett Paben

Travel Planning and Legacy Roads,Connecting the Dots…

n mid-March, Congress passed the Omnibus Appropriations Act o 2009 to und ederalgovernment operations or the remainder o scal year 2009 (through September). Thebill included important provisions on travel planning and Legacy Roads. First, it provid-ed an additional $50 million to the Forest Service or the FY 2009 Legacy Roads program.Second, it included report language (see Policy Primer, p. 6-7) that directed the ForestService to implement, on each national orest, a science-based roads analysis (as intendedsince 2001) to determine the minimum road system needed to meet resource managementand recreation needs. Wildlands CPR had promoted both o these and we were extremelypleased to see a 25% increase in Legacy Roads unding nationally or FY 2009.In early May, Forest Service Chie Gail Kimbell provided testimony to the House andSenate Interior Appropriations committees on the FY 2010 budget. In her verbal testimonyto the House committee she praised the Legacy Roads program, explaining that it waspopular throughout the agency and had been quite successul. In addition, Chie Kimbellspoke about the Forest Service component o President Obama’s FY 2010 budget proposal.For the rst time ever, the President’s budget included Legacy Roads explicitly – at thesame level as FY 2009 - $50 million. In addition, Obama unveiled three new Forest Service“Presidential Initiatives,” ocused on: eectively budgeting or wildre; conserving newlands, and; protecting the national orests.In her testimony, Kimbell linked travel planning and Legacy Roads work to each otherby reiterating one o Obama’s sub-priorities, to: “implement travel management planswith an emphasis on decommissioning unnecessary roads.” Kimbell explained this as anappropriate connection by pronouncing: “The National Forest System has a transporta-tion system that is not suited to its modern needs and requires realignment to “right-size”the system or the uture.” We consider it a victory when the Forest Service Chie adoptsour language about “right-sizing” the orest road system. Similarly, it’s a victory that boththe Chie and the President are explicitly discussing the need to decommission unneeded,ecologically damaging roads in their budget plans or FY 2010. The real victory, however,will be to get the agency to move rom words to action.This will be challenging, however. As explained in our Policy Primer (p. 6-7), the For-est Service recently released new travel planning directives that provide our loopholesso national orests can avoid ever having to undertake the ormal analysis necessary toidentiy that minimum road system. As a result, Wildlands CPR and many o our partnershave been meeting with Forest Supervisors, Regional Foresters, the Chie’s oce and eventhe Deputy Undersecretary o Agriculture to discuss this issue.In these meetings, we’ve explained the opportunities that would be wasted i theagency doesn’t undertake ull travel planning, including analyzing and identiying the mini-mum road system as soon as possible. Once those minimum systems are identied, androads are prioritized or reclamation, then it will be much easier or the agency to allocateany new watershed restoration unds (e.g. Legacy Roads).Wildlands CPR will continue to lead national eorts to advocate or Legacy Roads andsimilar watershed restoration unds. We’ll also work to ensure that unding and policiesare well-matched and mutually benecial. Unortunately, the Forest Service hasn’t yetbeen able to truly connect the dots between travel planning and Legacy Roads. Perhapssending them some nice new “sharpie” markers might help them along in the process?

The Road-RIPorter, Summer Solstice 2009

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ten reerred to as “the largest roadbuilding entity in the world,” the ForestService boasts a road system o nearly380,000 miles that cut across national orestlands. The agency also acknowledges a mini-mum o 60,000 miles o additional roads that arenot “ormally” in their system, but that do existon the land. Wildland roads degrade clean drink-ing water; ragment wildlie habitat; create vec-tors or the spread o non-native, invasive weeds;severely damage sheries and hunting oppor-tunities; and otherwise impact national orestresources. While some o these roads provideneeded access or resource management andothers provide recreational access, the agencyhas ar more roads than it needs or can man-age. The result: an oversized, under-maintained,unaordable, and ecologically destructive roadsystem. It took the agency nearly 100 years tobuild all these roads (mostly or logging), and itis likely to take just as long to reduce the roadsystem back down to a manageable size.With such a vast road system, and so muchpotential or ecological damage, Wildlands CPRset out in 2005 to conduct a ormal assessmento the Forest Service road system and its man-agement. We sent a Freedom o Inormation Act(FOIA) request to the Forest Service asking ordocuments relating to the road system and themethods the agency uses to manage and trackthat system in the 85 western national orests.Ater nearly two years o litigation and negotia-tion, the inormation arrived, and we are nownalizing a report about the agency’s road man-agement strategies and its ailure to eectivelyprotect America’s natural resources.Reviewing all o the FOIA inormationtogether paints a picture o a management ap-proach oriented to transportation rather thanland and resource management. By ocusingadministrative protocols on saety and roadmiles maintained, the Forest Service impedes itsown mission, which is “…to sustain the health,diversity, and productivity o the Nation’s orestsand grasslands to meet the needs o presentand uture generations” (US Forest Service2009). The agency should re-ocus on identiyingand mitigating the negative eects o the roadsystem. The ollowing sections provide moreinsight into the key documents we reviewed.

Wildlands CPR Issues New Reporton Forest Service Road Management

By Greg Peters and Sarah Peters (no relation)

Our primary analysis focused largely on:

•AnnualRoadAccomplishmentReports(RARs)•Implementationofthe2001and2005roadsandtransporta

tionmanagementrules•INFRAdatabaseofroadstatus/management

Key ndings in the report:

•Theagency’smanagementhasresultedin:•Decliningbiodiversity,degradedsheries,threatenedwatersupplies,fragmentedhabitat,andseriousresourcedamage.•Lostaccess:travelroutesavailableforpassengercarshavedroppedfrom93,000milesin1995to69,000milesin2006,thoughaccessforhighclearancevehicleshasincreased.•Decreasedmaintenanceofroads:theForestServicemain

tainsroughly15-20%ofitsroadsystemannuallyandonly20-30%ofroadsmeettheirassignedmaintenancelevels.•Increasedresourcedamage:manynationalforests(Olympic,GiffordPinchot,Flathead,Clearwater)havesufferedcata

strophicroadfailuresduetoseverestormsresultinginim

pairedsheriesandlossofhabitat.Streamsarealsoharmedbythecumulativeimpactsofchronicsedimentation.•RoadAccomplishmentReports(RARs)–whichactastheprimaryannualtrackingsystemforroadmanagement–arebudgetdrivendocumentsthathavelittleaccountabilityandtransparency,nordotheytrackecologicalissues.•Theagency’s2001RoadsRuleand2005TravelManagementRulehavebeenunderfundedandnotfullyimplemented.•TheForestService’sinfrastructuredatabase,INFRA,isanunwieldy,inaccurate,problemplaguedsystemthatdoesapoorjoboftrackingtheroadsystem.Fewifanyprotocolsexisttoguaranteeaccuracyandtherearenomechanismstotrackchangestothesystem.•TheForestServicedoesnothaveacomprehensive,formal,ac

countablemethodologyforeffectivelymanagingitsroadsystemandensuringthatitishavingonlyminimalimpactsonthepub

lic’snaturalresources.

Which way to the well-maintained Forest Service road system? Photo courtesy o BLM.