8 replies to this topic

[Superstar70]

It has just come to my attention a few days ago that the local BLM office is attempting to shut down a large portion of our local off-highway trails and roads.

Now wait! Before all of you think that you are from Califorina and it won't affect you, you should be aware that these closures WILL affect YOUR side of the lake as well.

If you visit here, or if you live here, and you like to go exploring our wonderful desert here, please take a moment and pay attention.

Now I know we are all tired of hearing about and dealing with land issues, and it for sure is no fun. I agree. Buuuut, if we all ignore these issues and go on to the next more entertaining topic, we all will soon have no place to explore out in the desert. Then we all will be FORCED to do nothing but surf the internet for photos of places we USED to be able to go and see for ourselves.

ALSO, those of you who go to Parker, this WILL affect you as well! Outlaying areas of Parker are on the chopping block now, but the bulk of Parker will face these same types of closures in the near future, only due to the type of terrian and other factors, Parker will be recieving more attention from those who would like to see public lands no longer public. In addition, Kingman, Bullhead, and other surrounding areas are up for grabs soon as well.

Anyway, in a rather sneaky attempt to get a lot of trails permanatly closed, the local BLM office held an open public hearing last week, but the small announcement in the paper that was seen by few, was creativly labeled to arouse no suspicion as to what was REALLY on the agenda. If you saw a small blurp about discussing local trails, would you be concerned? I wouldn't. But if that same little piece said "meeting to discuss local trail closures..."? You get the idea.

Long story short, the BLM admits to having the last 3 years or so to study the local trails, they have now proposed massive closures under very diffucult to understand and broad, generalized reasoning. In fact, I have yet to see any specfic reason for any of the proposed actions. They gave us 30 FRIGGEN DAYS, in the middle of the hottest part of the year, to evaulate the trails listed and respond. So, not only did they try and sneak it through, they did it at a time when it is difficult at best for anyone to go and see the trails in question due to the extreme heat (it has been around 113 the last week or so!). In addition, this time of year, many of our local 4-wheelers leave for cooler climates, and will never know about this until they return to find their land taken from them.

Due largely to the attention of local fabricator and rock racer Rick Mooneyham and his wife, there has been some effort to deal with this. Their efforts to spread the word gained enough letters from others to the local BLM office to get some attention. They got the mayor's attention, who was then able to get the BLM's attention. This has resulted in a 45 day review period "extension". While this is no where near enough time to really combat the issue, at least it is something.

Now, here is a link to the Lake Havasu BLM page outlining (kinda) what is going on.

http://www.blm.gov/az/st/en/prog/travel_mg...fo/hav-tmp.html

On that page you will see this-Four alternative route network maps. That will take you to another page that will let you view maps. LOOK at the maps. SEE the red lines. THOSE are EXSISTING TRAILS THAT THEY WILL SHUT DOWN IF WE DO NOTHING!!! There is a lot of red ink on those maps.

The maps, while at first appear to be really nice and user friendly, are next to useless if you wish to actually go out and visit a specific trail to see if it one of your favorite trails and thus comment on it to the BLM. We are at this time tring to get better info, but not suprisingly, that magically does not seem to be available.


NOW READ THIS!!! NO REALLY READ IT! Some time ago, several local four wheel drive clubs were approached by the BLM with a request for help. It went something like this-"Hey, help us GPS map all these trails out here, and we will document them as exsisting trails so that they will be protected from future leglislation, so that this way, only trails that are illegally created later can be closed." So of course everyone wants to do their part to keep their favorite roads open, and they mapped lots of trails. GUESS WHAT THOSE GPS MAPS REALLY GOT USED FOR? Uh-huh-mapping CLOSURES, not PROTECTING current assets. They were dupped. Talk about B.S.

Now, PLEASE, please, please, use the e-mail link to send the local office YOUR reasons to stop or at least limit the closures. They are making it rather diffucult to protest the whole closure issue in general, but are rather requesting specific reasons for specific trails which they have marked. This is very difficult even for someone who lives here to do, but if you can do that, so much the better.

Even easier, here is a link to Pirate 4X4, which has developed a letter generator just for this issue!-
http://www.pirate4x4.com/letters/
This enabled some 500 letters to be sent to the local BLM, and is at least partly responsible for the extension till the end of october that was just granted today due to the Mayors involvement.

If I come up with any more info, I will post it in this thread.

In the meantime, if any of you have any good ideas on how to combat this onslaught here, I would LOVE to hear them. Are there any groups that I can contact that can give us pointers on what to do? Anyone who can help?
I really want to insure that my efforts are not wasternor mis-directed. Several years ago myself and a few others spent a considerable amount of time and effort on this exact same issue in Williams, Az. with NO effect. Very fustrating, and very sad.

Any help is really needed, as usual.

Lastly, this issue is not ours (meaning Havasu or even Arizona), it is everywhere, and started with mandates put down years ago, we are all in this boat.

Thank you very much for your time!!!

[Air Cordeiro]

Thanks Superstar! I put my request in on pirate 4x4. I hope we can all help and get this resolved soon...

PLEASE people, take the time to help in this fight!!!

[DancerTracy]

WOW! I'm going to look into this right now. Myself and the rest of the Nicholls family loves geo caching and this would be a huge bummer to not be able to out in the desert.

[ltr450rider]

Sounds like a great way to Eff the winter economy. Good job "Ranger Dumbazz".

[brokedown]

On the flip side of this story I just read that there is a plan by the BLM to add 40,000 more acres to Glamis, Go figure!

http://www.ama-cycle...ory.asp?id=2196

[ltr450rider]

brokedown, on 30 August 2010 - 07:15 AM, said:

On the flip side of this story I just read that there is a plan by the BLM to add 40,000 more acres to Glamis, Go figure!

http://www.ama-cycle...ory.asp?id=2196

That's all BS. False Rumor.

[brokedown]

ltr450rider, on 30 August 2010 - 07:25 PM, said:

That's all BS. False Rumor.

This is the official news release from the BLM on the topic of Glamis:

http://www.blm.gov/c..._sun_dunes.html

[ltr450rider]

brokedown, on 31 August 2010 - 01:35 PM, said:

This is the official news release from the BLM on the topic of Glamis:

http://www.blm.gov/c..._sun_dunes.html

Interesting. Theres a link to the ASA site over on DDR saying that is all BS. Maybe Im just reading it wrong.

[Superstar70]

To keep updated on all BLM stuff, follow them on Facebook. All of their Press Releases are on there.

http://www.facebook....onal?ref=search