Expansion of Biking in Parks Is Proposed

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Mountain bikers, now barred from most backcountry areas in national parks, could have thousands of miles of trails opened up to them under a rule change proposed Thursday by the Interior Department. The proposal raised tensions between hikers and bikers, who face off against one another on dirt byways all over the country. Each group is burdened with a stereotype that is part true and part myth: thrill-seeking gear heads on one side, plodding leaf peepers on the other, each group accusing the other of not fully appreciating the great out-of-doors. “The question is whether it can be managed well — whether one group doesn’t deprive others of their enjoyment,” said Jeff Ruch, the executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a nonprofit alliance of local, state and federal scientists, law enforcement officers and land managers. In any case, Mr. Ruch added, “it’s a symptom of growing user conflict in the national park system.” The proposal would not take effect until the middle of next year at the earliest, National Park Service officials said, meaning that the Obama administration will decide on the issue. Under the plan, many trail usage decisions would be made at the level of individual parks, rather than at the central National Park Service office. Both sides say that would accelerate trail decisions and probably result in a new arena of discussion — or conflict — at each park headquarters, with administrators being lobbied by the two groups. Existing trails would be the main focus of the change; most proposals for new trails would still have to go through a more lengthy process of review at the Park Service headquarters. Opponents said that the rule change could open up to bicycling millions of acres now designated as potential wilderness (bikes would still be banned in outright wilderness areas), and that changes in usage could affect whether those lands were eventually given permanent wilderness protections by Congress....Under the Bushies there has been an expansion of oil & gas leasing, an expansion of mining, an expansion of timber harvesting and now an expansion of bicycles. And livestock grazing? The headline would be "A Contraction Of Grazing Is Proposed."