Opposes rescissionA0 noneSubstance 5/24Posted September 9, 2026 On Regulations.gov
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Dear Forest Service Leadership:
As someone who frequently hikes and recreates in the White Mountain National Forest, and visits other National Forests when possible, I am very concerned about what rescinding the 2001 Roadless Rule would do to our forests. I love these lands and have seen their value for our wildlife, our water, and our people. Allowing these forests to lost their protections would jepordize the very few places people can go to truly experience untouched, pure wilderness while also putting wildlife at risk.
The bobcats, bears, deer, red squirrels and birds that I've seen roam these forests would be greatly harmed by road units and the logging threat those roads create. The cool mountain streams with clean drinking water stay that way because the area around them is unroaded. These forests allow me to breathe and reset when I visit them because they are a step away from civilization; roads ruin that too.
Regarding the Presidential - Dry River Ext in the White Mountain National Forest, New Hampshire:
Intact roadless landscapes support functional soils, hydrology, and food webs that fragmented forests cannot replicate.
Roadless areas buffer and connect existing protected lands. Roadless areas are directly adjacent to protected areas on 58 percent of their land. They also reduce isolation between protected areas and add representation of underprotected ecosystem types — including cool temperate forests — that the existing protected-area system does not cover well (Talty et al. 2020). — Talty et al., 2020 (https://doi.org/10.1111/csp2.288); Belote, 2020 (https://doi.org/10.1111/csp2.288)
Rescinding the Roadless Rule would open the Presidential - Dry River Ext, White Mountain National Forest to road construction and associated ground disturbance. The direct and indirect effects of that activity are precisely what makes a specific comment about this area necessary.
Losing federal protection for our roadless areas means that crucial habitats are at risk of harmful changes. Our Alpine Zones in the White Mountains are precious. The roadless areas surrounding these summits help protect everything that supports the fragile wildlife in these mountains. The separation from urban life that roadless areas create protect the flora, fauna, and wildlife that occupies them.
Forest Service Chief Tom Schultz testified to the Senate that 24.5 million acres of inventoried roadless areas are within one mile of the Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI)—calling it "our primary concern." A GIS analysis by The Wilderness Society using the Forest Service's own data found the actual figure is just 2.8 million acres—a nearly ninefold exaggeration. Less than 5% of inventoried roadless area acreage is in close proximity to the WUI, not 42% as Schultz claimed. The administration has 23.3 million acres of non-roadless forest land already available near the WUI for fuel reduction—without ever touching a roadless area.
Moreover, the U.S. National Forests are the headwaters of our great rivers and the largest source of municipal water supply in the nation. According to DellaSala (2011), national forests supply drinking water to at least 124 million people in more than 3,400 communities across 33 states—roughly a third of all national-forest runoff originates in inventoried roadless areas. Roads are a major cause of water pollution. Because the 2001 Roadless Rule protects these headwaters, it is vital for maintaining clean drinking water for communities across the country. Major U.S. cities including Los Angeles, Portland, Denver, and Atlanta receive a significant portion of their water supply from national forests.
As the climate warms and species ranges shift northward and upslope, intact roadless areas are emerging as some of the most important climate refugia on the continent. Their unfragmented condition shelters cool microclimates, intact hydrology, and the connected habitat corridors that wildlife and plant communities need to adapt as conditions change. A growing body of peer-reviewed science identifies inventoried roadless areas as disproportionately important both as ecosystem-scale refugia — high-quality, undisturbed substrate that holds carbon and buffers temperature — and as species-scale refugia for cold-adapted, drought-sensitive, and otherwise climate-vulnerable populations. They also anchor portions of the Pacific, Central, Mississippi, and Atlantic migratory bird flyways, providing the unfragmented stopover and breeding habitat that hundreds of species depend on. Fragmenting these areas with new roads severs the very connectivity that climate adaptation requires.
Ultimately, rescinding the 2001 Roadless Rule puts our National Forests at risk of habitat destruction, obstructing wildlife corridors, and tainting clean waters necessary for many communities to maintain their drinking water supply.
File me under opposed.
~Leandra
CommentID: RLC-20260909-ARY9GR