I am a long term (30 year) resident of Kanab, in Kane County, Utah, on the doorstep of the magnificent Kaibab Plateau, part of the North Kaibab National Forest. My family has grown up hiking, camping and exploring this forest, and many other United States Forest Service (USFS) lands in Utah.
My husband and I remain avid hikers in this area, as well as regularly traveling to other states to hike and camp on USFS lands- Montana, Wyoming, Idaho, Colorado, Nevada, Arizona, California, New Mexico, North Dakota, South Dakota, Oregon, Washington, Iowa, Tennessee, Wisconsin and Illinois. I deeply value the wilderness qualities, scientific enrichment, recreation, and quiet solitude that public forests have provided me for the last forty years.
What happens to these lands, and especially the forests, is very important to me. Our local North Kaibab Forest already has plentiful roads and is busy with recreation and harvesting activity. Yet, one can still find solitude and quiet. It will deeply and negatively affect my experience on this local forest if more roads are built, increasing human and commercial/industrial impacts and noise pollution.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) has proposed repealing the 2001 Roadless Rule (Rule). This Rule has been in place with bipartisan support for 25 years and has protected roughly 4 million acres of old-growth and undeveloped USFS lands in Utah (and 45 million acres nationwide) from road building and commercial logging.
I strongly oppose this proposed repeal, as it will irreversible damage these forest lands- roads bring activity. With roads, whole forest areas will be inevitably be opened to more industrial development, extraction, and privatization. New roads make commercial logging, mining, drilling, and other damaging development easier. These activities cause the fragmenting of habitat, erosion of soils, degradation of streams, the spreading of invasive species and light and sound disruption. New roads increase human disturbance in places that were largely whole. Once the forests are developed in this way, they are forever changed. Once you cut down stands of majestic trees, the ecosystem suffers. Human disturbance degrades the silence.
All over the country, Roadless forests safeguard river headwaters that provide drinking water for millions of people and preserve wildlife habitat for hundreds of species of plants and animals. Whole, intact forest ecosystems support climate resilience. Many roadless forests are critical to the livelihood and culture of local native tribes, as the Kaibab Plateau is for the Kaibab Paiute People.
There are already more than enough roads on the North Kaibab Forest, and in most national forests that I have visited. There are several hundred thousand miles of roads nationwide. There is a multibillion-dollar maintenance backlog for these existing roads- it would be wise and responsible to fix these roads before making new ones.
The Roadless Rule has never closed roads or prevented people from reaching trailheads- it has benefitted outdoor recreation. Roadless forest areas are open for hiking, camping, hunting, fishing, and other recreation. The Rule also allows for fire suppression, fuels work and emergency road building for wildland firefighting. And yet the Rule strikes a balance that protects critical wildlife habitat, water, plant life, soils, solitude and cultural resources, values that visitors seek and enjoy. The Rule has protected the forests. It should not be repealed.
Thank you for consideration of my comments.