Recently, the Bitterroot National Forest completed a new forest-wide travel plan. The forest managers carefully balanced laws, court decisions, resource protections, existing uses and various user requests to reach the best possible plan. There are some people who are not happy with it, and probably few who like every part of it. However, as our first forester Gifford Pinchot would say, “it provides the greatest good to the greatest number in the long run.”
Many people in Montana opposed establishing Glacier National Park over 100 years ago, but who wants to eliminate it today? Protection for our public land is always opposed by a few people, but future generations always appreciate that we provided it.
We are very fortunate to have beautiful wild country left to protect here in the Bitterroot. To provide protections for the high quality quiet backcountry and resources we have, there are a few new limitations on where machines can go. However, there are still about 1500 miles of roads open to all vehicles. OHV’s, motorbikes, and mountain bikes have many hundreds of more miles of routes open. The Bitterroot NF even has over 100 miles of open roads that are totally surrounded by classified Wilderness or Wilderness quality lands. In winter, 500,000 acres are open to unrestricted snowmobile use. The Bitterroot NF has approved new OHV trails to create the long loop opportunities OHV users have requested. Large areas exist to develop even more trails for OHV’s, motorbikes, and mountain bikes, for users of all skill levels. Available funding seems to be the real constraint on developing and maintaining new recreation opportunities on the Bitterroot NF.
The Bitterroot National Forest is to be commended for developing an excellent travel plan to provide for all recreation users while also protecting our extremely valuable wild country.
Kirk Thompson
Stevensville