I am very against the roadless rule. The outdoors are my life I love the outdoors and it’s not worth trading OUR public land so ultra wealthy corporations can get richer. The outdoors and public lands are our legacy they’re the only thing we can continue to pass down to our children and protect. Once they’re gone they’re gone and there’s no getting the back.
I am writing about the High Uintas (UT) Roadless Area in Wasatch-Cache National Forest, Utah.
I have specific concerns about the rescission of Roadless Rule protections.
Headwater Protection for Endangered Colorado River Fish: The High Uintas roadless area contains the headwaters of the West Fork Blacks Fork, Provo River, Duchesne River, and Hayden Fork—critical source streams for three federally endangered fish species: bonytail, Colorado pikeminnow, and razorback sucker. These cold, sediment-free headwater reaches provide the spawning substrate and water quality these species require to survive. The area's high elevation and intact riparian buffers maintain the low water temperatures and stable flows that distinguish functional spawning habitat from degraded downstream reaches. Loss of headwater integrity directly reduces the survival rate of larvae and juveniles before they reach recovery zones in lower river segments.
Alpine and Subalpine Refugia for Cold-Climate Carnivores: The High Uintas' unfragmented expanse of spruce-fir forest, subalpine meadows, and alpine tundra across elevations from 8,400 to 12,479 feet provides the large, continuous territories required by Canada lynx (federally threatened) and North American wolverine (federally threatened). Both species require 50+ square miles of unbroken habitat to maintain viable populations; road construction fragments this landscape into isolated patches too small to support breeding populations. The area's elevational gradient—from Slate Gorge at 8,400 feet to Hayden Peak at 12,479 feet—creates a climate refugium where these species can shift upslope as temperatures warm, a migration corridor that roads would sever.
Limber-Bristlecone Pine and High-Elevation Bird Habitat: The Inter-Mountain Basins Subalpine Limber-Bristlecone Pine Woodland ecosystem in the High Uintas supports black rosy-finch (endangered, IUCN), rufous hummingbird (near threatened, IUCN), and olive-sided flycatcher (near threatened, IUCN), species dependent on the structural complexity and flowering phenology of high-elevation conifers and alpine vegetation. Road construction at these elevations removes the low-density, slow-growing trees that provide nesting and foraging habitat, and the disturbance-driven invasion of noxious weeds alters the understory plant community these birds depend on for food and cover.
Fen and Meadow Hydrological Function: The High Uintas contains Rocky Mountain Subalpine-Montane Fen ecosystems and extensive meadow complexes (Christmas Meadows, China Meadows, Broadhead Meadows, Kabell Meadows, Cataract Basin) that regulate streamflow, filter sediment, and provide habitat for vulnerable plant species including osha (Ligusticum porteri, vulnerable, IUCN) and white bog orchid (Platanthera dilatata, vulnerable, IUCN). These wetland-upland transition zones depend on intact hydrology; road fill and drainage ditches disrupt groundwater movement and lower water tables, converting fens to drier plant communities and eliminating the specific soil and moisture conditions these species require.
Getting rid of the roadless rule benefits no one except the ultra wealthy. I don’t know a single person who is for getting rid of it. For once listen to the people. The majority doesn’t want this rule abolished.
“Once the last tree has been cut down, the last fish been caught, and the last river polluted; Only then will we realize we cannot eat money”