Public Lands Issues

Winter Travel Management Planning

Travel Management Planning is how Federal public land managers designate specific trails and areas for motorized use. The process can be thought of as a type of comprehensive “zoning” where some areas are designated for motorized use, and other trails and areas are set aside for human-powered recreation, or to protect wildlife and their habitat. Winter Wildlands Alliance has long advocated for comprehensive winter recreation planning, and we are excited that the Forest Service is now undertaking this process in earnest. Thanks to a new (2015) regulation known as the Over-Snow Vehicle Rule, individual forests and ranger districts that do not already have winter travel plans in place will start developing them, and we will be there to ensure backcountry and Nordic skiers, snowboarders and snowshoers have a voice in the process.

Our Winter Travel Planning page is the place to learn all about the winter travel planning, the OSV Rule, and what you can do to get involved.

Public Lands Heist

The public lands heist is a tangled web, but there are essentially four major threads: (1) new legislation, (2) changes to regulations and the agencies that enforce them, (3) reviews and rollbacks of existing protections, and (4) administrative restructuring. Together, these efforts share a common goal – to separate the public from our public lands and to allow industry, especially the energy industry, to squeeze every last penny of possible profit from our common heritage.

Working closely with our Outdoor Alliance partners we are fighting back against the public lands heist on a number of fronts. One important element of this work is to keep track of legislation in Congress and letting you, the voting public, know what types of legislation your elected representatives are considering. To make this easier for you we’ve set up a bill tracker page where you can read about the bills that have caught our attention and contact your representatives in Congress to tell them how you, their constituent, think they should be voting.