U.S. FOREST SERVICE OHV ROUTE DESIGNATION RULE

OVERVIEW

The Forest Service will start “designation projects” either through the District Ranger for each district or through the Forest Supervisor for the entire forest.

The designation project will start with a listing of roads, trails, and areas the Forest Service has in their existing system.

The designation project will ask the public if they have other roads, trails, or areas they use or would like to use that do not appear on the Forest Service existing system.

It is highly unlikely that the Forest Service will actually go out into the field and conduct any kind of route inventory.

The Forest Service will combine its list of the existing system with the list of roads and trails pointed out by the public to come up with a final list.

The Forest Service will then go through the final list and determine which, if any, of the roads, trails, or areas in the final list are suitable for OHV use and designate them as open or open seasonally.

Most likely, this process of designating which roads, trails, and areas from the final list are designated as open or open seasonally will follow NEPA.

After a final decision is reached by the Forest Service the public will only be allowed to travel on those roads, trail, and in areas specifically designated for travel. All other routes and areas will be closed to motor vehicles.

Note: This is not the same thing as “Closed unless posted open” (CUPO). CUPO means that the public must assume that all roads, trail, and areas are closed to OHV use unless signed or posted as open. If a sign is missing you can’t ride there. Instead, this process let’s the public assume that all roads, trails, and areas that are marked on the map are open to OHV use. If the road, trail, or area is not on the map (or is on the map and indicated closed) then the public knows it is closed. The map is the guide, not the existence or absence of signs on the ground.