Land Closure: the Fight For the Open Range

Land Closure: The Fight For The Open Range

ROUNUP

DAVID EDWARDS

It’s 7 a.m. Sunday morning. And like every Sunday morning for years, riders are lined up outside the park gate, waiting to be let in so their day of riding and racing can begin. Except that this particular Sunday, the gates won’t open. And they’ll never open again.

This has happened in every state in the country, but California has just suffered the two most recent and graphic examples: Indian Dunes and Saddleback Park. Both parks were famous, both were well-established, and now both are gone forever.

But those are just two of the most publicized closures in the ongoing epic of parks and lands being roped off to motorcycles and other ORVs. You can probably name three such cases in your area. No place is immune from the you’re-not-welcomehere-anymore syndrome.

Of course, there are many different types of riding areas, and so there are many different reasons for the closures. Saddleback and Indian Dunes were on private land, meaning they were free enterprises operating strictly for profit. And when operating an area for motorcycle riding became less profitable than the alternatives, they closed. Running a motorcycle park is costly, so for both Saddleback and the ’Dunes, there’s more money in just about anything else.

The primary reason running a private motorcycle park is so expensive is the cost of insurance coverage against liability. Even though private parks for other recreational activities, such as snow skiing, incur similar risks, apparently motorcyclists are more likely to sue.

Each state, however, does have some form of landowner liability limitations. This means that landowners are somewhat protected against lawsuits resulting from injury on their property. But when that landowner charges a fee for riding, he becomes a concessionaire, and in most states that means he can be held responsible. That’s why private parks are becoming more rare.

Still, even public lands that don’t charge admission fees are becoming scarce. The American Motorcyclist Association's Land Use Coordinator, Roy Janson, struggles to keep up with the different hot spots around the country where ORV use is coming under fire. In Tennessee, for example, Turkey Bay in The Land Between The Lakes has traditionally been an off-road-riding haven but is now in danger of closure. The federal government is proposing a cut in the Tennessee Valley Authority's budget and suggesting that the Land Between the Lakes be “focused on energy production.” Translation: The land will be sold and used for the construction of energy plants.

Alternative land use ïsjust one reason for closures. Another can be attributed only to simple, old-fashioned, anti-motorcycle sentiment.

Lor example, in Southern Llorida’s Big Cypress National Preserve, a half-million-acre area north of the Everglades, ORVs have been restricted by the Llorida Game Commission because that’s the habitat of a highly endangered species: the Llorida panther. On the surface, that seems reasonable; but according to Janson, closer investigation reveals that the panther is just an excuse to get ORVs out of the area.

It seems there are only six known panthers spread out over the entire half-million acres, and that the lead-> ing cause of panther kills last year had nothing to do with ORVs, but rather were road kills; the panther’s leading predators are Peterbilts and station wagons, not motorcycles and all-terrain vehicles.

On the other hand, some areas have perfectly good reasons for not wanting motorcycles around anymore. One is Uwharrie National Forest in North Carolina, where severe erosion problems aren’t getting any better with continued ORV use. As a result, restrictions are being tightened and enforced.

In fact, all national forests currently are developing more-structured ORV use plans. Previously, each of the 1 54 national forests was left to regulate itself, but now they all are required to submit Land and kesource Management Plans to the Department of Agriculture. Among other things, the LRMPs make each forest map out if, where and how ORVs should be used. That translates to more restrictions in all cases. How much more simply depends on local public réponse.

So the bottom-line for off-road riders everywhere is a familiar one: show interest. Anti-motorcycle factions and pro-motorcycle factions are locked in an ongoing battle in which the only weapons are concern and involvement. And in the long run, only one thing is certain: The side that loses the least will be the one that cares the most.