Comment Analysis · Docket FS-2025-0001

FS-2025-0001-329228

Opposes rescissionA1 strongSubstance 16/24Owed an answerPosted September 7, 2026 On Regulations.gov

In short: The comment establishes that the agency's analysis fails to quantify aquatic resource impacts (stream miles, fish populations) and wildfire net effects, relies on an asymmetric economic analysis that ignores habitat quality and long-term reliance interests, and that the proposed rescission is not narrowly tailored given the agency's admitted $6.9 billion maintenance backlog and existing regulatory exceptions.

Scored directly — The comment's whole text was scored on its own.

Scorecard

Each dimension is scored 0–3; the eight sum to the substance score out of 24.

Specific placeNames a specific location — from a region down to an exact creek, trail, road, or map reference.
Local knowledgeDraws on a first-hand connection to the place — visits, sustained activity, occupation, or a professional role.
EA analysisEngages the agency's environmental analysis directly.
Analytical gapIdentifies something the analysis fails to address.
EvidenceBacks claims with specific facts, data, or research.
RequestMakes a specific, actionable request of the agency.
AlternativeProposes a different course of action.
LegalCites statutes, regulations, or legal obligations.

How hard it is to set aside

A1 strong: Must be answered — it names the law.

Owed an answer on Analytical gap, Evidence, Alternative, Legal.

Standard dismissals it defeats

Already addressed The agency says its analysis already covers the point. Defeated when the comment cites the law itself: there is no analysis to cite against a statutory claim.
Misreads the proposal The agency says the comment misunderstands what is proposed. Defeated when the comment engages the proposal or a named place directly.
No cause and effect shown The agency says the comment asserts a harm without showing how the action causes it. Defeated when the comment shows the mechanism.
Outside the scope The agency says the comment asks about a different action. Defeated when the comment is specific and tied to this proposal.
Certified not substantive The agency certifies the comment raises nothing substantive. Defeated when the comment alleges illegality, which is substantive by the definition the certification runs on.

Still open to the agency

Alternative already eliminated The agency says it considered and eliminated the alternative the comment proposes, with a reason. Cannot be defeated from the comment text alone.
Deferred to a later decision The agency says the point belongs to a later, site-specific decision. Cannot be defeated from the comment text alone.
Not required The agency says the analysis the comment asks for is not required. Cannot be defeated from the comment text alone.
Preference noted The agency notes the comment as a statement of preference and takes no action on it. Cannot be defeated from the comment text alone.

Topics

Wildlife Habitat
- “last strongholds for native and wild salmonids”
- “intact riparian corridors, natural sediment regimes, cold water”
- “fine sediment in spawning gravels suppressing egg-to-fry survival”
- “exclusion of salmonid stronghold watersheds”
Water Quality Quantity
- “Roadless watersheds hold the best remaining wild and native trout water”
- “riparian loss raising water temperature”
- “municipal source-water watersheds”
- “connected stream networks”
Recreation Tourism Public Use
- “fly fished National Forest System waters for over 30 years”
- “lost recreationist benefit”
- “Recreational fishing supports guides, outfitters, lodges”
- “next generation to be able to fish it”
Forest Management Wildfire
- “wildfire rationale is not narrowly tailored”
- “9.8 million acres — 24 percent of affected roadless area — overlap the wildland-urban interface”
- “36 CFR 294.13(b) already permits cutting to reduce hazardous fuels”
- “greater access can raise human-caused ignition potential”

What it names

National Forests: Pisgah National Forest
Law cited: 36 CFR 294.13(b)36 CFR part 294

Attachments

1 file. Counts as 1 — Counts as one: The attachments enclose no one else's submissions; the comment counts as one.

Own letter

The comment

Shaded passages are the ones the analysis quoted as evidence for a dimension: Analytical gapEvidenceLegal

Comment on RIN 0596-AD66, Docket FS-2025-0001, 91 FR 53827 I oppose rescission of the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule and urge the Department to select the No Action alternative. I am an individual commenter, not an industry representative. I have fly fished National Forest System waters for over 30 years, primarily in Pisgah National Forest, and I donate annually to coldwater habitat conservation. Roadless watersheds hold the best remaining wild and native trout water in this country, and I want the next generation to be able to fish it. 1. The rule does not analyze the resource at issue. Inventoried roadless areas are the last strongholds for native and wild salmonids — cutthroat, bull trout, redband, wild steelhead, inland Chinook — because they retain intact riparian corridors, natural sediment regimes, cold water, and connected stream networks. The impacts summary (91 FR 53829-53830) quantifies board feet and road miles but never stream miles or fish populations. The final EIS should disclose how many miles of stream supporting native salmonid strongholds, ESA-listed fish, or designated critical habitat fall within the 18.2 million acres newly open to permanent roads and the 4.8 million acres newly open to harvest, and the current Watershed Condition Framework ratings of those watersheds. 2. The Department concedes it cannot maintain the roads it has. Road effects on fisheries are among the best-documented findings in aquatic science: fine sediment in spawning gravels suppressing egg-to-fry survival, undersized culverts fragmenting habitat, altered peak flows destabilizing channels, riparian loss raising water temperature. These effects persist for decades and are worst where roads go unmaintained. The preamble acknowledges a $6.9 billion deferred maintenance backlog for roads and bridges (91 FR 53830). An agency that cannot maintain its existing system should not add permanent mileage in steep, remote, high-value watersheds. The final EIS should analyze aquatic effects assuming that shortfall continues, not design standards the agency's budget history shows it cannot fund. 3. The wildfire rationale is not narrowly tailored. By the Department's own figures, 9.8 million acres — 24 percent of affected roadless area — overlap the wildland-urban interface. Roughly three-quarters does not. Rescinding protection across all 58.5 million acres to reach fuels work in that subset is poorly fitted to the stated purpose. Moreover, 36 CFR 294.13(b) already permits cutting to reduce hazardous fuels, and the 2001 Rule has never restricted suppression. If those exceptions are administratively unworkable (91 FR 53828), the remedy is to streamline them, not eliminate the protection. The EIS should analyze that alternative, and should quantify the net wildfire effect, since the preamble concedes greater access can raise human-caused ignition potential (91 FR 53830) and ignitions track road access. 4. The economic analysis is asymmetric. The rule weighs $5.2-11.4 million in annual timber revenue to the Treasury and Forest Service, plus $4.6-10.6 million to industry, against roughly $6.1 million in lost recreationist benefit. The timber figure is itself described as unlikely to be realized; the recreation figure appears to capture only lost use value in currently operable areas. Recreational fishing supports guides, outfitters, lodges, fly shops, and rural service economies that depend on habitat quality, not access alone — and habitat degradation is a decades-long reduction in the asset generating that revenue, not a construction inconvenience. The analysis should value habitat quality, include recreational fishing explicitly, and apply a consistent time horizon to benefits and losses. The finding of no significant effect on commercial fishing also cannot rest on limited current operability when the preamble concedes later plan amendments could expand where roads and harvest are allowed. 5. Reliance interests. For twenty-five years anglers, guides, outfitters, and donors have relied on roadless protection when siting businesses and directing restoration dollars and easements; downstream restoration loses value if the headwaters above it are opened to roads. The final rule must consider these reliance interests and explain its reversal of longstanding policy. Requested action: 1. Retain 36 CFR part 294 Subpart B in full. 2. If the Department proceeds, adopt a narrowly tailored alternative permitting WUI and infrastructure-adjacent fuels treatment and streamlining the 294.13(b) exceptions, while continuing to prohibit new permanent roads and commercial harvest elsewhere, and excluding salmonid stronghold watersheds, watersheds with ESA-listed fish or critical habitat, and municipal source-water watersheds. Thomas Orndorff, Brevard NC