Untracked Utah: off-road vehicle sales are booming, but wilderness isn't a drive-thru experience

Sierra, Jan-Feb, 2003 by David Darlington

Of the seven wilderness study areas the BLM identified in the Swell in 1980, none has yet been officially preserved. Utah politicians generally treat wilderness designation as akin to domestic terrorism, and the state's Republican congressional representatives have repeatedly tried to pass token wilderness bills that would actually eliminate most wilderness areas. (Luckily, they have repeatedly been stymied by the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, the Sierra Club, and others.) The latest tack is from Utah's Republican governor, Mike Leavitt. Having complained long and loud about monuments created by President Bill Clinton, Leavitt now proposes that President George W. Bush declare the San Rafael Swell a national monument. Mining and drilling would be prohibited (they are largely obsolete in the Swell anyway), but decisions about vehicle access would be left to the BLM, based on local (read: anti-wilderness) input.

We got a taste of the local perspective as we approached the Sids Mountain Wilderness Study Area. On the trail toward the Devil's Racetrack we encountered a BLM kiosk papered with an array of messages posted by local ATV users, including Mark Williams's outfit:

The Sage Riders and the SouthEastern Utah Off-Highway Vehicle Club ask that you obey the law and stay out of closed areas. The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance (SUWA) and the Sierra Club (SC) are watching this area, taking pictures and documenting any illegal intrusions.... We ask that you obey all closures and that you confine your travel to the approved trails, routes, and roads .... By putting tracks in areas that are closed you are handing SUWA & SC the ammunition that they need.

None of us agrees with all of the WSA ]wilderness study area] boundaries, the BLM's failure to acknowledge the many roads within those boundaries, the closure of most of those roads, or the selfish acts of SUWA. But, we do agree that the best way to protect access to the roads and trails that remain open is to obey the law. Please don't sacrifice our children's access for tomorrow by selfishly breaking the law today.

THIS WOULD HAVE BEEN MORE ENCOURAGING WERE it not for the fact that the "approved" trail in question led into a wilderness study area, which is supposed to be treated as wilderness until Congress decides whether it should be protected. Back in 1991 the BLM had recommended closing 10 percent (more than 150,000 acres) of the Swell to ORVs, but when angry letters poured in from riders, the plan was put on hold. It took a lawsuit by the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, the Sierra Club, and six other environmental groups to force the BLM to begin controlling ORV damage. As a result of the lawsuit, the agency did order an emergency closure of the seven wilderness study areas in the Swell--except, that is, for four routes in the Sids Mountain area, including the one we were on.

The consequences lay before us. Tire tracks repeatedly strayed from the path, making forays into adjacent areas in spite of the signs lining the trail. Some signs had been pulled out or run over, as had several plants. In many places, cryptobiotic soil--the organic microbial layer that binds the desert surface, protecting it from erosion--had been overrun and obliterated. Nevertheless, the BLM's "preferred alternative" is to leave the Devil's Racetrack trail open to mechanized vehicles.