Opinion
Mountain bikers push to ride through wilderness
![Avatar photo](https://www.explorebigsky.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/cropped-Jen_300px-46x46.jpg)
![Avatar photo](http://www.explorebigsky.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/cropped-Jen_300px-46x46.jpg)
Published
3 days agoon
Posted By
Jen Clancey![](https://www.explorebigsky.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/Bob-Marshall-Wilderness-Montana-courtesy-Wilderness-Watch.jpeg)
By Kevin Proescholdt WRITERS ON THE RANGE
“Something will have gone out of us as a people if we ever let the remaining wilderness be destroyed…” — Wallace Stegner
The goal of the Wilderness Act, now celebrating its 60th birthday, was to set aside a small proportion of public land in America from human intrusion. Some places, the founders said, deserved to be free from motorized, mechanized and other intrusions to protect wildlife and wild lands.
But now, a handful of mountain bikers have partnered with a senator from Utah to gut the Wilderness Act.
This June, the Sustainable Trails Coalition, a mountain biking organization, cheered as Utah Republican Senator Mike Lee introduced a bill (S. 4561) to amend the Wilderness Act and allow mountain bikes, strollers, and game carts on every piece of land protected by the National Wilderness Preservation System. Stopping these intrusions would take each local wilderness manager undertaking a cumbersome process to say “no.”
The U.S. Congress passed the Wilderness Act, and President Lyndon B. Johnson signed it into law on September 3, 1964, to “preserve the wilderness character” of 54 wilderness areas totaling 9.1 million acres. Today, this effort has become a true conservation success story.
The National Wilderness Preservation System now protects over 800 wilderness areas totaling over 111 million acres in 44 states and Puerto Rico, making it America’s most critical law for preserving wild places and the genetic diversity of thousands of plant and animal species. Yet designated wilderness is only 2.7% of the Lower 48, and still just about 5% if Alaska is included.
The protections of the Wilderness Act include a ban on logging, mining, roads, buildings, structures and installations, mechanized and motorized equipment and more. Its authors sought to secure for the American people “an enduring resource of wilderness” to protect places not manipulated by modern society, where the ecological and evolutionary forces of nature could continue to play out mostly unimpeded.
Grandfathered in, however, were some grazing allotments, while mining claims were also allowed to be patented until 1983. Many private mining claims still exist inside designated wildernesses.
Senator Lee’s bill is premised on the false claim that the Wilderness Act never banned bikes, and that supposedly, the U.S. Forest Service changed its regulations in 1984 to ban bikes. But bicycles, an obvious kind of mechanized equipment, have always been prohibited in wilderness by the plain language of the law. (“There shall be…no other form of mechanical transport….”) The Forest Service merely clarified its regulations on this point in 1984 as mountain bikes gained popularity.
Unfortunately, bikers in the Sustainable Trails Coalition are not the only recreational interest group that wants to weaken the Wilderness Act to. Some rock climbers, for example, are pushing Congress to allow climbers to damage wilderness rock faces by pounding in permanent bolts and pitons rather than using only removable climbing aids. In addition, trail runners want exemptions from the ban in wilderness on commercial trail racing. Drone pilots and paragliders want their aircraft exempted from Wilderness Act protections, and recreational pilots want to “bag” challenging landing sites in wilderness.
The list of those seeking to water down the Wilderness Act is growing.
Most of these recreational groups say they support wilderness, understanding how important it is when most landscapes and wildlife habitats have been radically altered by people. At the same time, they want to slice out their own piece of the wilderness pie.
Must we get everything we want in the outdoors? Rather than weakening the protections that the Wilderness Act provides, we could try to reinvigorate a spirit of humility toward wilderness. We could practice restraint, understanding that designated wildernesses have deep values beyond our human uses of them.
Meanwhile, in response to growing demand for mountain biking trails, the Bureau of Land Management invites over a million mountain bikers each year to ride its thousands of miles of trails. And the U.S. Forest Service already has a staggering 130,000 miles of motorized and nonmotorized trails available to mountain bikers.
Do mountain bikers and others pushing for access really need to domesticate wilderness, too?
Let’s cherish our wilderness heritage, whole and intact. We owe it to the farseeing founders of the Wilderness Act, and we owe it to future generations.
Kevin Proescholdt is a contributor to Writers on the Range, writersontherange.org, an independent nonprofit dedicated to spurring lively conversation about the West. He is conservation director for Wilderness Watch, a national wilderness conservation organization headquartered in Missoula, Montana.
Jen Clancey is the Digital Producer for Explore Big Sky.
![](https://www.explorebigsky.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/ebs_logo_white_220px.png)
![](https://www.explorebigsky.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/11/ebs_logo_white_220px.png)
Upcoming Events
july, 2024
Event Type :
All
All
Arts
Education
Music
Other
Sports
Event Details
CALL FOR ARTISTS: Paint anytime from June 1-28EXHIBITION & SALE: June 29 - July 31Calling all artists and nature enthusiasts! Get
more
Event Details
CALL FOR ARTISTS: Paint anytime from June 1-28
EXHIBITION & SALE: June 29 – July 31
Calling all artists and nature
enthusiasts! Get your paintbrushes ready for an unforgettable experience at
Paint Under the Big Sky, a thrilling plein air event set against the stunning
backdrop of Big Sky, MT, Chet Huntley’s “The Last Best Place”. Don’t
miss this chance to unleash your creativity and be part of a vibrant artistic community.
What is Paint Under the Big Sky? PUBS is a plein air event for all painters of any ability (over the age of 16). Sponsored by the Big Sky Artist’s Studio & Gallery and the Big Sky Artists Collective, a non-profit organization whose mission is to foster a strong community of artists in the Big Sky area, the paint-out hopes to introduce painters to our extraordinary landscape for an opportunity to create, meet and have fun. Plein air painters record our landscape for generations to come.
Artists are invited to travel to Big
Sky, MT to paint anytime between Jun 1 – 28, and participate in the exhibition
and sale of paintings from June 29 – July 31.
Come join us! We have a great
place to paint and are welcoming and fun!
Don’t miss out!
Time
June 1 (Saturday) 1:00 am - July 31 (Wednesday) 11:55 pm
Event Details
Embrace the freedom and serenity of movement in nature with our rejuvenating morning yoga class on the Mountain Lawn. Allow the fresh mountain air and gentle guided yoga practice
Event Details
Embrace the freedom and
serenity of movement in nature with our rejuvenating morning yoga class on the
Mountain Lawn. Allow the fresh mountain air and gentle guided yoga practice to
invigorate your day of adventure ahead. Complimentary. Weather
permitting.
Time
June 1 (Saturday) 7:00 am - August 31 (Saturday) 7:00 am
Location
Montage Big Sky
995 Settlement Trail
Event Details
Bike Big Sky is a FREE community mountain biking group with BSCO and Gallatin Alpine Sports. Meet at posted locations at 6 p.m. Monday evenings. Visit BSCO.org or swing by
Event Details
Bike Big Sky is a FREE community mountain biking group with BSCO and Gallatin Alpine Sports. Meet at posted locations at 6 p.m. Monday evenings. Visit BSCO.org or swing by GAS for ride information.
Time
June 10 (Monday) 6:00 pm - August 19 (Monday) 6:00 pm
Event Details
Bike Big Sky is a FREE community mountain biking group with BSCO and Gallatin Alpine Sports. Meet at posted locations at 6 p.m. Monday evenings. Visit BSCO.org or swing by
Event Details
Bike Big Sky is a FREE community mountain biking group with BSCO and Gallatin Alpine Sports. Meet at posted locations at 6 p.m. Monday evenings. Visit BSCO.org or swing by GAS for ride information.
Time
June 17 (Monday) 6:00 pm - August 26 (Monday) 6:00 pm