The Stanislaus Forest recently released a new version of its Over-Snow Vehicle Management Plan. That OSV plan is the latest attempt by the Forest Service to identify areas where snowmobile use is allowed within the vast local national forest, while supposedly ensuring that quiet recreation visitors to the forest also have places to safely recreate.
So why should environmentalists be alarmed by this winter recreation plan?
Of greatest concern, the plan proposes to make it legal to ride snowmobiles into two wild roadless areas where the Stanislaus Forest Plan currently prohibits any motorized use. Once motorized use is legally allowed in a wild area, there is little chance of Congress in the future giving that area permanent Wilderness protection. So if the proposed OSV Plan gets approved by Stanislaus Forest supervisor Jason Kuiken, the two scenic wild areas will end up with greatly diminished chances for preservation.
And second, the Plan would allow noisy snowmobile use to intrude deep into remote habitat that is critically important for the rare Sierra Nevada red fox. The at-risk American marten would also be affected.
PACIFIC VALLEY AND EAGLE ROADLESS AREAS ARE AT RISK
The Pacific Valley roadless area is located south of Highway 4, adjacent to the Carson-Iceberg Wilderness. It contains thousands of acres of rugged, rocky terrain, scattered conifer forests, and stringer meadows. The Eagle roadless area is located east of Pinecrest and west of Eagle Peak. It extends for a long distance along the northern boundary of the Emigrant Wilderness, and it contains old growth forests, many meadows, and some scenic volcanic rock formations as well as miles of volcanic ridges.
Both wild areas are highly touted by CSERC as prime candidates for future wilderness designation. More important, both areas also contain habitat of value for the Sierra Nevada red fox and the marten (as does the Sonora Pass, another area proposed for expanded snowmobile use). Allowing snowmobile riders to roar across mountainsides or to zip high up steep slopes to “highmark” with their machines is the kind of disturbance that needlessly adds stress to the already difficult struggles these species face in such rugged, frigid conditions.
Plan contains 5 alternatives – FS aims to adopt Alt. 5, the Preferred Alternative
In response to the USFS’s first version of this OSV Plan, CSERC and other organizations collectively endorsed Alternative 3. That Alternative would still allow large areas of high elevation forest lands to be open to snowmobile use, but Alternative 3 would not open up roadless wild areas or critical wildlife habitat to snowmobile use.
Throughout the planning process, snowmobile interests have dominated meetings (such as the recent one shown in the photo to the right). Catering to the motorized interests, the Forest Service ignored our conservation groups’ request to keep snowmobiles out of wild areas, and instead, the agency refined its original Proposed Action (Alternative 1) to instead drop some of the areas in the Proposed Action that snowmobilers really didn’t support. Thus, Alternative 5 (the Preferred Alternative) appears to shrink the amount of area proposed to be open to snowmobile use. In reality, only areas that were not desired by snowmobilers got dropped.
In reality, there are only so many areas within the Stanislaus Forest where winter conditions produce the one-foot-deep minimum snow depth that the Forest Service claims is needed for benign snowmobile use. Most of those areas that are accessible from Highway 4 or Highway 108 are now planned to be open to snowmobile use. Thus, forest visitors who seek places to cross-country ski, snowshoe, or to snow play with their families have limited areas.
While vast areas of the forest will be “available” for quiet recreation, they often are located miles distant from the plowed highways that provide the only access for most visitors.
WHAT CAN CONCERNED CITIZENS DO?
The Forest Service has held OSV plan open house meetings where large numbers of snowmobile enthusiasts have packed the sessions to advocate for the maximum amount of areas designated for snowmobiles. The Forest Service has heard little from those who snowshoe, ski, or snow-play – or from those who want wild, roadless areas permanently protected.
Your input can help to make a difference. SEND YOUR COMMENTS TO:
Stanislaus National Forest
Attn: Over-Snow Vehicle Use Designation
19777 Greenley Road
Sonora, CA 95370
This is a link to a USFS map showing the preferred alternative and the proposed new entries into the roadless areas (labeled incorrectly on the map as “Alpine Area” and “Hwy 108 East Area”:
https://www.fs.usda.gov/nfs/11558/www/nepa/100952_FSPLT3_4404795.pdf