The US Forest Service is updating its land management plan. Activist mountain bikers think they are being treated unfairly; they won’t be allowed in wilderness areas because their recreation form is not primitive and unconfined. Bikers say their vehicles help them enjoy nature, but campers and hikers looking at the metal ensemble of simple machines don’t think so. The bikes do not have a carbon footprint, and they’re not that much more mechanical than equipment used in allowable activities like compound bow hunting, kayaking, fishing with modern rods and reels, rock climbing with gear, and hunting with guns that go boom. The Forest Service’s problem is the bikes are a “mechanized means of conveyance.”
by Leslee Kulba
Wild West blogger