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Frequently Asked Questions about Mountain Biking
Frequently Asked Questions about Mountain Biking
Michael Vandeman, Ph.D. Updated April 3, 2007 1. Why do people mountain bike? a. They say that using a bike allows them to get much farther, in the same amount of time, than they can by walking. They also maintain constant pressure on land managers, to open more and more trails to bikes. Of course, all of these trails are already open to them, if they choose to walk. They also frequently claim that closing trails to bikes "excludes" them from the parks. This could only be true if they were unable to walk. Of course, they are able to walk. There's nothing inherently wrong with bicycling instead of walking; we all like to save energy, when it's appropriate. Use of a bicycle to replace automobile use is obviously beneficial. However, by the same token, replacing hiking with mountain biking is obviously not beneficial. b. They are interested in the quantity of nature they can see, rather than the quality of their experience. While riding a bike, especially over terrain as rough as a trail, one has to be constantly paying attention to not crashing. That makes it almost impossible to notice much else. By contrast, a hiker feels the ground, hears all the sounds and smells all the odors of nature and can stop instantly, if he/she finds something interesting. The brain thrives on stimulation. A biker has to travel several times as far as a hiker, to get the same stimulation as a hiker. (And, by the same token, motorcyclists have to travel several times as far as a bicyclist, and an auto user several times as far as a motorcyclist, since they are enclosed in a metal box.) c. They are interested in thrills. Riding a bike on a trail, especially a trail containing many obstacles, or a trail one is not familiar with, is very challenging. (But if mountain biking is the high point of your week, as it seems to be for many mountain bikers, you must be leading a pretty dull life, off of the bike!) d. They are interested in building mountain biking skills and competing with other mountain bikers. The thrill of racing drives people to spend more money on their bike, and ride it harder and more often. Racing, up to and including the Olympics, drives a lot of mountain biking. Of course, it is also extremely harmful to the parks and natural areas that are used for practice! It is hard to think of any other (legal) use of public lands, other than hunting, that is as harmful as mountain biking. 2. What is driving the sport of mountain biking? Besides the attraction for participants, manufacturers and retailers of mountain bikes and mountain biking accessories, as well as "adventure" travel guides, make a lot of money from promoting mountain biking. Even some auto manufacturers (e.g. Subaru) promote and sponsor mountain biking, and try to use its popularity to sell more cars. The tourism industry also promotes mountain biking, among other attractions. 3. What harm does mountain biking do? a. Most obvious is the acceleration of erosion. Knobby tires rip into the soil, loosening it and allowing rain to wash it away. They also create V-shaped grooves that make walking difficult or even dangerous. The mechanical advantage given by the gears and ball bearings allow a mountain biker to travel several times as fast as a hiker. Given their increased weight (rider plus bike), this results in vastly increased momentum, and hence much greater horizontal (shearing) forces on the soil. (Witness the skid marks from stops, starts, and turns.) According to Newton, every action has an equal and opposite reaction. Mountain bikes were built much stronger than other bikes, so that they could withstand the greater forces they were subject to on rough trails. These same forces, therefore, are being applied to the trails! To give a definite number, the winner of a 20-mile race here in Briones Regional Park averaged 13 MPH (the speed limit is 15 MPH -- where were the park rangers?). b. A hiker must be very careful not to accidentally step on small animals and plants on the trail. For a mountain biker, it is almost impossible to avoid killing countless animals and plants on and under the trail. They have to pay attention to controlling the bike, and can't afford to look carefully at what is on the trail, especially when travelling fast. And even if they happen to see, for example, a snake, it is hard for them to stop in time to avoid killing it. A hiker, when crossing a creek, will try to avoid getting wet, by crossing on stepping stones or logs. Mountain bikers, on the other hand, simply ride right through the creek bed, crushing any animals or plants that happen to be there. Mountain biking magazines are full of photos of mountain bikers throwing up spray, as they barrel through creeks. Not only do bikes destroy animals and plants as they ride across streams, they ride through streams stirring up sediment. The sediment in the water interferes with the oxygen uptake by aquatic life, for example, killing fish- and frog eggs. Young fish, insects, amphibians, and aquatic microorganisms are extremely sensitive to sediment in water. c. Bikes also allow people to travel several times as far as a hiker. This translates into several times the impacts, both on the trail and on the wildlife (to say nothing of the other trail users). Existing parklands are already inadequate to protect the wildlife that live there. When they are crisscrossed by mountain bikers and legal or illegal trails, their habitat becomes even more inadequate. Mountain bikers frequently advertise rides of 20-50 miles or more. Have you ever tried to walk that far in a day? In other words, allowing bikes in a park greatly increases human presence in that park and drives wildlife further from the resources that they need to survive, including water, food, and mates. d. Due to their width and speed, bikes can't safely pass each other on narrow trails. Therefore, policies that permit mountain biking also result in more habitat destruction, as trails are widened by bikers (or by hikers and equestrians jumping out of their way). e. Knobby mountain bike tires are ideal for carrying mud, and consequently exotic plants, fungi, and other organisms from place to place, resulting in the spread of exotic invasive species, such as weeds and Sudden Oak Death. f. Mountain biking is driving the very young and old off of the trails and hence out of the parks. Even able-bodied hikers and equestrians fear for their safety, and don't enjoy sharing the trails with bikes. (The mountain bikers claim that they are simply being selfish and "unwilling to share", but actually they have no problem sharing trails with mountain bikers; it is only their bikes that are a problem!) g. Mountain bikes, which are obviously built to go anywhere, teach children and anyone else who sees them that the rough treatment of nature is acceptable. This undoubtedly has a negative effect on people's treatment of nature. h. In order to mitigate bike-caused erosion, park managers have been resorting to extreme measures -- even in some cases putting a plastic matrix or other exotic material under the trail (e.g. in Pleasanton Ridge Regional Preserve, near Pleasanton, California)! It's hard to imagine that this will have a beneficial effect on the park and its wildlife…. i. Allowing mountain bikes in a park greatly increases the damage to the trails, damage from "bootleg" (illegally created) trails, and the problems of conflicts between trail users, and hence the cost of maintaining the park. Considering how tight park budgets are, we can't afford the extra costs of policing, and repairing the damage from, mountain biking. j. For the science on mountain biking and its impacts on wildlife and people, see http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande/scb7.htm. 4. Mountain bikers claim that their sport has no greater environmental impact than hiking. Is that true? a.If you read the "studies" that make that claim, you find that they don't really compare the impacts of hiking and mountain biking, but only the impacts per foot. If, for a moment, we assume that the studies are correct in their having equivalent impacts per foot, it would still follow that mountain biking has far greater impact per person, since mountain bikers typically travel so much farther than hikers. Besides overlooking distances travelled, those "studies" almost all ignore impacts on wildlife. And they don't study mountain biking under normal conditions -- only at a very slow speed. Actually, the comparison with hiking is irrelevant. It would only be relevant if we planned to allow only one of the two, and were considering which of the two is more harmful. In fact, no one is considering banning hiking. We are only considering adding mountain biking. Therefore, the only relevant question is, "Is mountain biking harmful"? (Of course, it is!) There is only one truly scientific study that I know of that compares the impacts of hiking and mountain biking. It found that mountain biking has a greater impact on elk than hiking (Wisdom, M. J., H. K. Preisler, N. J. Cimon, B. K. Johnson. 2004. Effects of Off-Road Recreation on Mule Deer and Elk. Transactions of the North American Wildlife and Natural Resource Conference 69, 2004, pp.531-550.) See http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande/scb7. b. On its web site, IMBA mentions recent research on mountain biking by Dave White et al and Jeff Marion, both of whom claim that mountain biking and hiking have "similar" impacts. Is that true? First, "similar" is not a scientific term and really has no clear meaning. That term is being used only to obfuscate. Second, these are survey studies, not experimental studies. By its very nature, a survey study cannot be used to compare the impacts from two activities, because it doesn't control all the variables. For example, we don't know if the differences in erosion between two trails are due to the mountain biking vs. hiking use, or due to differences in the weather, terrain, steepness, soil type, management practices, amount of use, hikers on the "mountain biking trail", mountain bikers on the "hiking trail", etc. White et al only measured their trails once, and didn't even collect any data on hiking impacts! See http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande/white and http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande/marion. c. Why would a researcher risk his/her reputation by doing such shoddy work? For money! And to ensure the continuance of their sport. If land managers think that mountain biking is more harmful than hiking, they will be more likely to close trails to bikes. Bike parts manufacturer Shimano paid Professor White to do his study. Research funds are difficult to obtain. A researcher who can be relied upon to produce research favorable to mountain biking will be able to obtain funding from the mountain biking industry. A researcher who tells the truth about mountain biking won't be able to obtain research funds and will risk stunting his/her career. 5. Where should mountain biking allowed? A couple of role models for wildlife protection are Yosemite National Park and East Bay Municipal Utility District (in Alameda and Contra Costa counties, California). They both restrict bicycles to paved roads, where they can't do much harm. Somehow bicyclists have managed to enjoy their sport for over a hundred years, without riding off-road. 6. What should the policy be on trails? Closed to bikes, unless marked open. Signs that say "No Bikes" are quickly and repeatedly ripped out of the ground by mountain bikers. 7. Isn't it discriminatory to allow hikers and equestrians on trails, but not mountain bikers? Mountain bikers love to say this, apparently because they think it will gain them some sympathy. The truth is that mountain bikers have exactly the same access to trails that everyone else has! It is only their bikes that are banned. If mountain bikers were really being discriminated against, they could easily go to court to gain access. However … they already have access to every trail in the world! 8. Don't I have a right to mountain bike on all public lands? I am a taxpayer! The public has the right, through its elected representatives, to restrict how land is used. A federal court has already ruled that there is no right to mountain bike. It is a privilege, and any land manager who gives a good reason (such as safety or protecting the environment) can keep bikes off of trails (see http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande/mtb10.htm). 9. Don't mountain bikers do some good things, like trail construction and trail maintenance? Trail construction destroys wildlife habitat both directly (by killing plants and animals) and indirectly (by reducing the size of the intervening "islands" of habitat). Moreover, mountain bikers favor trails that are "twisty" (sinuous), bumpy, and full of obstacles that provide thrills for mountain bikers. Such designs increase habitat destruction (by lengthening the trail) and make the trails less useful for hikers and equestrians. Trail maintenance sounds good, until you realize that it would hardly be necessary, if bikes weren't allowed there. The mountain bikers are the main reason why trail maintenance is necessary! Trails used only by hikers require hardly any maintenance. Therefore, admitting bicycles to a park greatly increases its cost of maintenance. Nothing is really "free", including trail construction and maintenance. (How does the saying go? "Beware of Trojans bearing gifts"?) 10. But don't mountain bikers provide added safety, by being able to quickly summon help in the event of an emergency? I would rather trust in a cell phone, than a speeding mountain biker. Besides, natural areas are already one of the safest places you can be. In over 50 years of hiking and backpacking, I have never witnessed any situation requiring emergency aid. Most people go to natural areas partly for solitude. If we wanted to be around large, fast-moving pieces of machinery, we would stay in the city! 11. Can't mountain biking help get our overweight kids off the couch? Hiking can already do that, without causing extra harm to wildlife and people. Mountain biking downhill provides zero exercise benefit. Mountain biking on level ground provides minimal exercise benefit, much less than walking. Since it's impossible to pay any attention to your surroundings while mountain biking (or you will crash), there's no reason to promote mountain biking. It benefits only those who stand to make money off of it, such as bike manufacturers, retailers, and tour companies. 12. Doesn't mountain biking get people out of their cars? So do walking, road cycling, and transit use, without harm to the natural environment. Since very few mountain biking opportunities are within easy bicycling distance, the vast majority of mountain bike trips require transporting the bike in a truck, SUV, or car. If mountain bikers cared about the environment, they would bicycle to the park, lock their bike at the trailhead, and hike. Or simply bicycle on paved roads, as bicyclists have for the past century. 13. Doesn't the threat from mountain biking pale, in comparison to other sources of environmental damage, such as logging? Maybe, and maybe not. Mountain biking teaches people that the rough treatment of nature is acceptable, so it may lead to many other abuses. In parks, where most mountain biking is done, it is probably the most harmful activity allowed. But even if mountain biking is less damaging than another activity, such as logging, it is still additional damage. If an area is already messed up (e.g. by logging), how does that make it okay to do additional damage? It doesn't! 14. What's wrong with night riding? Humans have been destroying wildlife habitat for centuries, so that very little remains. Our presence in parks prevents wildlife from using a large part of their habitat, at least during the daytime. Now that night riding is becoming popular, wildlife and being denied that habitat even at night, or incur an increased risk getting run over, if they attempt to use it. There is very little law enforcement even during the day in these days of tight budgets. There is no patrolling of parks at night! This gives mountain bikers free rein to do whatever they want, including riding trails that are closed to bikes or even building their own illegal trails. No wonder night riding is so popular! And, of course, night riding makes an activity that is already very dangerous, much more dangerous. 15. Don't the vast majority of mountain bikers ride responsibly? Actually, just the opposite is true. In a scientific study that IMBA had on their website for a while, then quietly removed, 83.1% of mountain bikers broke the law (see http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande/mtb76). 16. Aren't the problems with mountain biking just caused by "a few bad apples"? There aren't just a few! There are enough to put some in just about every park in the world. The same problems appear everywhe riding off-trail, riding where prohibited, illegal trail construction, excessive speed, accelerating erosion, killing plants and animals on and next to the trail, driving other trail users off the trails, etc. Note: I was the Chair of the Wildlife Committee of the Sierra Club's San Francisco Bay Area Chapter for a decade. During the same period, I studied conservation biology and the environmental impacts of mountain biking, which are summarized in my paper "The Impacts of Mountain Biking on Wildlife and People -- A Review of the Literature" http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande/scb7.htm. === I am working on creating wildlife habitat that is off-limits to humans ("pure habitat"). Want to help? (I spent the previous 8 years fighting auto dependence and road construction.) Please don't put a cell phone next to any part of your body that you are fond of! http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande |
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Frequently Asked Questions about Mountain Biking
Geesh - a little one-sided don't you think - I'm sure you'll have
great success convincing people of your way - unless of course you get a bunch of idiots on your side - any intelligent person can see through and realize that all the negs can be reversed - dumbass! |
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Frequently Asked Questions about Mountain Biking
Oh wait - just saw your name - Mike Vandeman - you're an asshole -
almost forgot about you. |
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Frequently Asked Questions about Mountain Biking
On 3 Apr 2007 12:17:44 -0700, "Jimbo" wrote:
Geesh - a little one-sided don't you think - I'm sure you'll have great success convincing people of your way - unless of course you get a bunch of idiots on your side - any intelligent person can see through and realize that all the negs can be reversed - dumbass! Typical mountain biker. NOT ONE specific, because then you could easily be refuted. === I am working on creating wildlife habitat that is off-limits to humans ("pure habitat"). Want to help? (I spent the previous 8 years fighting auto dependence and road construction.) Please don't put a cell phone next to any part of your body that you are fond of! http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande |
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Frequently Asked Questions about Coal Interests Fight Polar Bear Action :: Unequivocal, Mike Vandeman, "warming of the climate system is unequivocal"
On Apr 3, 7:59 am, Mike Vandeman wrote:
Frequently Asked Questions Michael Vandeman, Ph.D. Coal Interests Fight Polar Bear Action :: Unequivocal, Mike Vandeman, "warming of the climate system is unequivocal" http://www.statesman.com/blogs/conte...interests.html Coal Interests Fight Polar Bear Action An organization representing companies that mine coal and burn it to make electricity has called on its members to fight the proposed listing of the polar bear as an endangered or threatened species. "This will essentially declare 'open season' for environmental lawyers to sue to block viirtually any project that involves carbon dioxide emissions," the Western Business Roundtable said in an e-mail. To settle a lawsuit by environmental groups, the Department of Interior announced last month that it would take a year to consider whether global warming and melting Arctic ice justifies declaring the bear "endangered" or "threatened" under the Endangered Species Act. "This seems a little unfair, pitting all those big coal companies and power companies against the poor polar bear," sniffed Frank O'Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch. http://www.salon.com/news/feature/20...urce=whitelist Inside the secretive plan to gut the Endangered Species Act Proposed regulatory changes, obtained by Salon, would destroy the "safety net for animals and plants on the brink of extinction," say environmentalists. March 27, 2007 | The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is maneuvering to fundamentally weaken the Endangered Species Act, its strategy laid out in an internal 117-page draft proposal obtained by Salon. The proposed changes limit the number of species that can be protected and curtail the acres of wildlife habitat to be preserved. It shifts authority to enforce the act from the federal government to the states, and it dilutes legal barriers that protect habitat from sprawl, logging or mining. "The proposed changes fundamentally gut the intent of the Endangered Species Act," says Jan Hasselman, a Seattle attorney with Earthjustice, an environmental law firm, who helped Salon interpret the proposal. "This is a no-holds-barred end run around one of America's most popular environmental protections. If these regulations stand up, the act will no longer provide a safety net for animals and plants on the brink of extinction." In recent months, the Fish and Wildlife Service has gone to extraordinary efforts to keep drafts of regulatory changes from the public. All copies of the working document were given a number corresponding to a person, so that leaked copies could be traced to that individual. An e-mail sent in March from an assistant regional director at the Fish and Wildlife Service to agency staff, asking for comments on and corrections to the first draft, underscored the concern with secrecy: "Please Keep close hold for now. Dale [Hall, director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service] does not want this stuff leaking out to stir up discontent based on speculation." Many Fish and Wildlife Service employees believe the draft is not based on "defensible science," says a federal employee who asked to remain anonymous. Yet "there is genuine fear of retaliation for communicating that to the media. People are afraid for their jobs." Chris Tollefson, a spokesperson for the service, says that while it's accurate to characterize the agency as trying to keep the draft under wraps, the agency has every intention of communicating with the public about the proposed changes; the draft just hasn't been ready. And, he adds, it could still be changed as part of a forthcoming formal review process. Administration critics characterize the secrecy as a way to maintain spin control, says Kieran Suckling, policy director of the Center for Biological Diversity, a national environmental group. "This administration will often release a 300-page-long document at a press conference for a newspaper story that will go to press in two hours, giving the media or public no opportunity to digest it and figure out what's going on," Suckling says. "[Interior Secretary Dirk] Kempthorne will give a feel-good quote about how the new regulations are good for the environment, and they can win the public relations war." In some ways, the proposed changes to the Endangered Species Act should come as no surprise. President Bush has hardly been one of its fans. Under his reign, the administration has granted 57 species endangered status, the action in each case being prompted by a lawsuit. That's fewer than in any other administration in history -- and far fewer than were listed during the administrations of Reagan (253), Clinton (521) or Bush I (234). Furthermore, during this administration, nearly half of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service employees who work with endangered species reported that they had been directed by their superiors to ignore scientific evidence that would result in recommendations for the protection of species, according to a 2005 survey of more than 1,400 service biologists, ecologists and botanists conducted by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a nonprofit organization. "We are not allowed to be honest and forthright, we are expected to rubber stamp everything," wrote a Fish and Wildlife Service biologist as part of the survey. "I have 20 years of federal service in this and this is the worst it has ever been." The agency has long seen a need to improve the act, says Tollefson. "This is a look at what's possible," he says. "Too much of our time as an agency is spent responding to litigation rather than working on recovering the species that are most in need. The current way the act is run creates disincentives for people to get involved with recovering species." Kempthorne, boss of the Fish and Wildlife Service, has been an outspoken critic of the act. When he was a U.S. senator from Idaho in the late 1990s, he championed legislation that would have allowed government agencies to exempt their actions from Endangered Species Act regulations, and would have required federal agents to conduct cost-benefit analyses when considering whether to list a species as endangered. (The legislation failed.) Last June, in his early days as interior secretary, Kempthorne told reporters, "I really believe that we can make improvements to the act itself." Kempthorne is keeping good on his promise. The proposed draft is littered with language lifted directly from both Kempthorne's 1998 legislation as well as from a contentious bill by former Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Calif. (which was also shot down by Congress). It's "a wish list of regulations that the administration and its industry allies have been talking about for years," says Suckling. Written in terse, dry legal language, the proposed draft doesn't make for easy reading. However, the changes, often seemingly subtle, generally serve to strip the Fish and Wildlife Service of the power to do its stated job: to protect wildlife. Some verge on the biologically ridiculous, say critics, while others are a clear concession to industry and conservative Western governors who have long complained that the act degrades the economies of their states by preventing natural-resource extraction. One change would significantly limit the number of species eligible for endangered status. Currently, if a species is likely to become extinct in "the foreseeable future" -- a species-specific timeframe that can stretch up to 300 years -- it's a candidate for act protections. However, the new rules scale back that timeline to mean either 20 years or 10 generations (the agency can choose which timeline). For certain species with long life spans, such as killer whales, grizzly bears or wolves, two decades isn't even one generation. So even if they might be in danger of extinction, they would not make the endangered species list because they'd be unlikely to die out in two decades. "It makes absolutely no sense biologically," wrote Hasselman in an e- mail. "One of the Act's weaknesses is that species aren't protected until they're already in trouble and this proposal puts that flaw on steroids." Perhaps the most significant proposed change gives state governors the opportunity and funding to take over virtually every aspect of the act from the federal government. This includes not only the right to create species-recovery plans and the power to veto the reintroduction of endangered species within state boundaries, but even the authority to determine what plants and animals get protection. For plants and animals in Western states, that's bad news: State politicians throughout the region howled in opposition to the reintroduction of the Mexican gray wolf into Arizona and the Northern Rockies wolf into Yellowstone National Park. "If states are involved, the act would only get minimally enforced," says Bob Hallock, a recently retired 34-year veteran of the Fish and Wildlife Service who, as an endangered species specialist, worked with state agencies in Idaho, Washington and Montana. "States are, if anything, closer to special economic interests. They're more manipulated. The states have not demonstrated the will or interest in upholding the act. It's why we created a federal law in the first place." Additional tweaks in the law would have a major impact. For instance, the proposal would narrow the definition of a species' geographic range from the landscape it inhabited historically to the land it currently occupies. Since the main reason most plants and animals head toward extinction is due to limited habitat, the change would strongly hamper the government's ability to protect chunks of land and allow for a healthy recovery in the wild. The proposal would also allow both ongoing and planned projects by such federal agencies as the Army Corps of Engineers and the Forest Service to go forward, even when scientific evidence indicates that the projects may drive a species to extinction. Under the new regulations, as long as the dam or logging isn't hastening the previous rate of extinction, it's approved. "This makes recovery of species impossible," says Suckling. (You can read the entire proposal, a PDF file, here.) Gutting the Endangered Species Act will only thicken the pall that has hung over the Fish and Wildlife Service for the past six years, Hallock says. "They [the Bush administration] don't want the regulations to be effective. People in the agency are like a bunch of whipped dogs," he says. "I think it's just unacceptable to go around squashing other species; they're of incalculable benefit to us. The optimism we had when this agency started has absolutely been dashed." http://www.earthjustice.org/news/pre...otections.html Bush Administration Rewrite of Endangered Species Act Regulations Would Gut Protections Hush-hush proposal "a no-holds-barred end run around one of America's most popular laws" Washington, DC -- A secret draft of regulations that fundamentally rewrite the Endangered Species Act was leaked to two environmental organizations, which provided them to the press last night An article in Salon quotes Earthjustice attorney Jan Hasselman saying, "The proposed changes fundamentally gut the intent of the Endangered Species Act." The changes are fiercely technical and complicated, but make future listings extremely difficult, redefine key concepts to the detriment of protected species, virtually hand over administration of the act to hostile states, and severely restrict habitat protections. Many of the changes -- lifted from unsuccessful legislative proposals from then-Senator (now Interior Secretary) Dirk Kempthorne and the recently defeated congressman Richard Pombo -- are reactions to policies and practices established as a result of litigation filed by environmental organizations including Earthjustice. "After the failure of these legislative proposals in the last Congress, the Bush administration has opted to gut the Endangered Species Act through the only avenue left open: administrative regulations," said Hasselman. "This end-run around the will of Congress and the American people will not succeed." A major change would make it more difficult for a species to gain protection, by scaling back the "foreseeable future" timeframe in which to consider whether a species is likely to become extinct. Instead of looking far enough ahead to be able to reasonably determine whether a species could be heading for extinction, the new regulations would drastically shorten the timeframe to either 20 years or 10 generations at the agency's discretion. For species with long generations like killer whales and grizzly bears, this truncated view of the future isn't nearly enough time to accurately predict whether they are at-risk now. "These draft regulations represent a total rejection of the values held by the vast majority Americans: that we have a responsibility to protect imperiled species and the special places they call home," said Kate Freund, Legislative Associate at Earthjustice. According to several sources within the Fish and Wildlife Service quoted by Salon, hostility to the law within the agency has never been so intense. "I have 20 years of federal service in this and this is the worst it has ever been," one unnamed source is quoted as saying. In addition, the proposal would allow projects by the Forest Service and other agencies to proceed even if scientific evidence suggests that the projects might drive species to extinction so long as the rate of decline doesn't accelerate owing to the project. The Bush administration's antipathy to the law is shown by the numbers of species it has protected, in each case as the result of litigation -- 57. By comparison, 253 species were listed during the Reagan administration, 521 under Clinton, and 234 under Bush I. The administration reportedly had expected to reveal the new regulations in a few weeks. The draft regulations must be published in the Federal Register for public comment before they can become final, which is likely to be at least a year off. Contact: Jan Hasselman, Earthjustice, (206) 343-7340, ext. 25 |
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Frequently Asked Questions about Mountain Biking
Mike Vandeman wrote in
: On 3 Apr 2007 12:17:44 -0700, "Jimbo" wrote: Geesh - a little one-sided don't you think - I'm sure you'll have great success convincing people of your way - unless of course you get a bunch of idiots on your side - any intelligent person can see through and realize that all the negs can be reversed - dumbass! Typical mountain biker. NOT ONE specific, because then you could easily be refuted. Mike, here is the situation as I see it. 1) I ride a mountain bike for fun and exercise, I ride a road bike for fun and exercise, and I ride my commuter bike for transportation and exercise. All these activities are safe and legal. 2) I ride my mountain bike where it is safe and legal (for example Left Hand Canyon, Hall Ranch); I do not ride it where it is prohibited (for example Rocky Mountain National Park (RMNP)). 3) I am a hiker and a backpacker. I pack in RMNP several times a year. I have never seen a mountain biker in RMNP. I do see huge ruts where the hiking trails are. I also see where 'social trails' are forming where hikers are avoiding the ruts. 4) I have hiked and ridden my mountain bike on mixed use trails (hikers, people riding mountain bikes and equestrians) and have never seen an issue/altercation/problem between groups. I have actually seen the opposite, where one group helped the other with directions and/or helpful information. 5) I have never accidentally killed an animal while riding my mountain bike. I have witnessed mule deer watch me as I ride by. They hardly even stopped eating while we rode by. 6) Do you honestly think you have convinced even one person who rides a mountain bike to quit? If not, you are wasting your time. To sum it up, every argument you have to stop riding a mountain bike is false, it is completely legal (In most places) and you are powerless to stop it. Stop wasting you time and go work on something you can have a real impact on. Chris -- Posted via a free Usenet account from http://www.teranews.com |
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Frequently Asked Questions about Coal Interests Fight Polar Bear Action :: Unequivocal, Mike Vandeman, "warming of the climate system is unequivocal"
Idiot
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Frequently Asked Questions about Mountain Biking
"Mike Vandeman" wrote in message ... snip Note: I was the Chair of the Wildlife Committee of the Sierra Club's San Francisco Bay Area Chapter for a decade. During the same period, I studied conservation biology and the environmental impacts of mountain biking, which are summarized in my paper "The Impacts of Mountain Biking on Wildlife and People -- A Review of the Literature" You WERE the Chair. Very good Michael. Still a nutcase, but at least you've made a baby step. Now, if you would like to update your sigline, ask me how. I'd be glad to help. |
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Frequently Asked Questions about Mountain Biking
On 05 Apr 2007 12:57:39 GMT, Chris wrote:
Mike Vandeman wrote in : On 3 Apr 2007 12:17:44 -0700, "Jimbo" wrote: Geesh - a little one-sided don't you think - I'm sure you'll have great success convincing people of your way - unless of course you get a bunch of idiots on your side - any intelligent person can see through and realize that all the negs can be reversed - dumbass! Typical mountain biker. NOT ONE specific, because then you could easily be refuted. Mike, here is the situation as I see it. 1) I ride a mountain bike for fun and exercise, I ride a road bike for fun and exercise, and I ride my commuter bike for transportation and exercise. All these activities are safe A lie. and legal. Totally irrelevant 2) I ride my mountain bike where it is safe and legal (for example Left Hand Canyon, Hall Ranch); I do not ride it where it is prohibited (for example Rocky Mountain National Park (RMNP)). 3) I am a hiker and a backpacker. I pack in RMNP several times a year. I have never seen a mountain biker in RMNP. I do see huge ruts where the hiking trails are. I also see where 'social trails' are forming where hikers are avoiding the ruts. Irrelevant. 4) I have hiked and ridden my mountain bike on mixed use trails (hikers, people riding mountain bikes and equestrians) and have never seen an issue/altercation/problem between groups. I have actually seen the opposite, where one group helped the other with directions and/or helpful information. In places where there a lot of mountain bikers, the hikers and equestrians who don't like it are forced to abandon the trails. Hence, you don't see them. Not that you would report it honestly, if you did see a problem. 5) I have never accidentally killed an animal while riding my mountain bike. You have no way of knowing. I have witnessed mule deer watch me as I ride by. They hardly even stopped eating while we rode by. Mule deer are notorious for not caring. Irrelevant. Elk and bighorn sheep, on the other hand, run away. If you knew the research, you would know that. 6) Do you honestly think you have convinced even one person who rides a mountain bike to quit? Of course not. Mountain bikers have no interest in the truth. And if they did change their habits, they wouldn't have the guts to admit it. Their friends would klil them. If not, you are wasting your time. To sum it up, every argument you have to stop riding a mountain bike is false, it is completely legal (In most places) and you are powerless to stop it. Stop wasting you time and go work on something you can have a real impact on. Chris Considering how many trails are off-limits to bikes, I have already had an impact. === I am working on creating wildlife habitat that is off-limits to humans ("pure habitat"). Want to help? (I spent the previous 8 years fighting auto dependence and road construction.) Please don't put a cell phone next to any part of your body that you are fond of! http://home.pacbell.net/mjvande |
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Frequently Asked Questions about Mountain Biking
Coal Interests Fight Polar Bear Action :: Unequivocal, Mike Vandeman,
"warming of the climate system is unequivocal" http://www.statesman.com/blogs/conte...interests.html Coal Interests Fight Polar Bear Action An organization representing companies that mine coal and burn it to make electricity has called on its members to fight the proposed listing of the polar bear as an endangered or threatened species. "This will essentially declare 'open season' for environmental lawyers to sue to block viirtually any project that involves carbon dioxide emissions," the Western Business Roundtable said in an e-mail. To settle a lawsuit by environmental groups, the Department of Interior announced last month that it would take a year to consider whether global warming and melting Arctic ice justifies declaring the bear "endangered" or "threatened" under the Endangered Species Act. "This seems a little unfair, pitting all those big coal companies and power companies against the poor polar bear," sniffed Frank O'Donnell, president of Clean Air Watch. http://www.salon.com/news/feature/20...urce=whitelist Inside the secretive plan to gut the Endangered Species Act Proposed regulatory changes, obtained by Salon, would destroy the "safety net for animals and plants on the brink of extinction," say environmentalists. March 27, 2007 | The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is maneuvering to fundamentally weaken the Endangered Species Act, its strategy laid out in an internal 117-page draft proposal obtained by Salon. The proposed changes limit the number of species that can be protected and curtail the acres of wildlife habitat to be preserved. It shifts authority to enforce the act from the federal government to the states, and it dilutes legal barriers that protect habitat from sprawl, logging or mining. "The proposed changes fundamentally gut the intent of the Endangered Species Act," says Jan Hasselman, a Seattle attorney with Earthjustice, an environmental law firm, who helped Salon interpret the proposal. "This is a no-holds-barred end run around one of America's most popular environmental protections. If these regulations stand up, the act will no longer provide a safety net for animals and plants on the brink of extinction." In recent months, the Fish and Wildlife Service has gone to extraordinary efforts to keep drafts of regulatory changes from the public. All copies of the working document were given a number corresponding to a person, so that leaked copies could be traced to that individual. An e-mail sent in March from an assistant regional director at the Fish and Wildlife Service to agency staff, asking for comments on and corrections to the first draft, underscored the concern with secrecy: "Please Keep close hold for now. Dale [Hall, director of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service] does not want this stuff leaking out to stir up discontent based on speculation." Many Fish and Wildlife Service employees believe the draft is not based on "defensible science," says a federal employee who asked to remain anonymous. Yet "there is genuine fear of retaliation for communicating that to the media. People are afraid for their jobs." Chris Tollefson, a spokesperson for the service, says that while it's accurate to characterize the agency as trying to keep the draft under wraps, the agency has every intention of communicating with the public about the proposed changes; the draft just hasn't been ready. And, he adds, it could still be changed as part of a forthcoming formal review process. Administration critics characterize the secrecy as a way to maintain spin control, says Kieran Suckling, policy director of the Center for Biological Diversity, a national environmental group. "This administration will often release a 300-page-long document at a press conference for a newspaper story that will go to press in two hours, giving the media or public no opportunity to digest it and figure out what's going on," Suckling says. "[Interior Secretary Dirk] Kempthorne will give a feel-good quote about how the new regulations are good for the environment, and they can win the public relations war." In some ways, the proposed changes to the Endangered Species Act should come as no surprise. President Bush has hardly been one of its fans. Under his reign, the administration has granted 57 species endangered status, the action in each case being prompted by a lawsuit. That's fewer than in any other administration in history -- and far fewer than were listed during the administrations of Reagan (253), Clinton (521) or Bush I (234). Furthermore, during this administration, nearly half of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service employees who work with endangered species reported that they had been directed by their superiors to ignore scientific evidence that would result in recommendations for the protection of species, according to a 2005 survey of more than 1,400 service biologists, ecologists and botanists conducted by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, a nonprofit organization. "We are not allowed to be honest and forthright, we are expected to rubber stamp everything," wrote a Fish and Wildlife Service biologist as part of the survey. "I have 20 years of federal service in this and this is the worst it has ever been." The agency has long seen a need to improve the act, says Tollefson. "This is a look at what's possible," he says. "Too much of our time as an agency is spent responding to litigation rather than working on recovering the species that are most in need. The current way the act is run creates disincentives for people to get involved with recovering species." Kempthorne, boss of the Fish and Wildlife Service, has been an outspoken critic of the act. When he was a U.S. senator from Idaho in the late 1990s, he championed legislation that would have allowed government agencies to exempt their actions from Endangered Species Act regulations, and would have required federal agents to conduct cost-benefit analyses when considering whether to list a species as endangered. (The legislation failed.) Last June, in his early days as interior secretary, Kempthorne told reporters, "I really believe that we can make improvements to the act itself." Kempthorne is keeping good on his promise. The proposed draft is littered with language lifted directly from both Kempthorne's 1998 legislation as well as from a contentious bill by former Rep. Richard Pombo, R-Calif. (which was also shot down by Congress). It's "a wish list of regulations that the administration and its industry allies have been talking about for years," says Suckling. Written in terse, dry legal language, the proposed draft doesn't make for easy reading. However, the changes, often seemingly subtle, generally serve to strip the Fish and Wildlife Service of the power to do its stated job: to protect wildlife. Some verge on the biologically ridiculous, say critics, while others are a clear concession to industry and conservative Western governors who have long complained that the act degrades the economies of their states by preventing natural-resource extraction. One change would significantly limit the number of species eligible for endangered status. Currently, if a species is likely to become extinct in "the foreseeable future" -- a species-specific timeframe that can stretch up to 300 years -- it's a candidate for act protections. However, the new rules scale back that timeline to mean either 20 years or 10 generations (the agency can choose which timeline). For certain species with long life spans, such as killer whales, grizzly bears or wolves, two decades isn't even one generation. So even if they might be in danger of extinction, they would not make the endangered species list because they'd be unlikely to die out in two decades. "It makes absolutely no sense biologically," wrote Hasselman in an e- mail. "One of the Act's weaknesses is that species aren't protected until they're already in trouble and this proposal puts that flaw on steroids." Perhaps the most significant proposed change gives state governors the opportunity and funding to take over virtually every aspect of the act from the federal government. This includes not only the right to create species-recovery plans and the power to veto the reintroduction of endangered species within state boundaries, but even the authority to determine what plants and animals get protection. For plants and animals in Western states, that's bad news: State politicians throughout the region howled in opposition to the reintroduction of the Mexican gray wolf into Arizona and the Northern Rockies wolf into Yellowstone National Park. "If states are involved, the act would only get minimally enforced," says Bob Hallock, a recently retired 34-year veteran of the Fish and Wildlife Service who, as an endangered species specialist, worked with state agencies in Idaho, Washington and Montana. "States are, if anything, closer to special economic interests. They're more manipulated. The states have not demonstrated the will or interest in upholding the act. It's why we created a federal law in the first place." Additional tweaks in the law would have a major impact. For instance, the proposal would narrow the definition of a species' geographic range from the landscape it inhabited historically to the land it currently occupies. Since the main reason most plants and animals head toward extinction is due to limited habitat, the change would strongly hamper the government's ability to protect chunks of land and allow for a healthy recovery in the wild. The proposal would also allow both ongoing and planned projects by such federal agencies as the Army Corps of Engineers and the Forest Service to go forward, even when scientific evidence indicates that the projects may drive a species to extinction. Under the new regulations, as long as the dam or logging isn't hastening the previous rate of extinction, it's approved. "This makes recovery of species impossible," says Suckling. (You can read the entire proposal, a PDF file, here.) Gutting the Endangered Species Act will only thicken the pall that has hung over the Fish and Wildlife Service for the past six years, Hallock says. "They [the Bush administration] don't want the regulations to be effective. People in the agency are like a bunch of whipped dogs," he says. "I think it's just unacceptable to go around squashing other species; they're of incalculable benefit to us. The optimism we had when this agency started has absolutely been dashed." http://www.earthjustice.org/news/pre...otections.html Bush Administration Rewrite of Endangered Species Act Regulations Would Gut Protections Hush-hush proposal "a no-holds-barred end run around one of America's most popular laws" Washington, DC -- A secret draft of regulations that fundamentally rewrite the Endangered Species Act was leaked to two environmental organizations, which provided them to the press last night An article in Salon quotes Earthjustice attorney Jan Hasselman saying, "The proposed changes fundamentally gut the intent of the Endangered Species Act." The changes are fiercely technical and complicated, but make future listings extremely difficult, redefine key concepts to the detriment of protected species, virtually hand over administration of the act to hostile states, and severely restrict habitat protections. Many of the changes -- lifted from unsuccessful legislative proposals from then-Senator (now Interior Secretary) Dirk Kempthorne and the recently defeated congressman Richard Pombo -- are reactions to policies and practices established as a result of litigation filed by environmental organizations including Earthjustice. "After the failure of these legislative proposals in the last Congress, the Bush administration has opted to gut the Endangered Species Act through the only avenue left open: administrative regulations," said Hasselman. "This end-run around the will of Congress and the American people will not succeed." A major change would make it more difficult for a species to gain protection, by scaling back the "foreseeable future" timeframe in which to consider whether a species is likely to become extinct. Instead of looking far enough ahead to be able to reasonably determine whether a species could be heading for extinction, the new regulations would drastically shorten the timeframe to either 20 years or 10 generations at the agency's discretion. For species with long generations like killer whales and grizzly bears, this truncated view of the future isn't nearly enough time to accurately predict whether they are at-risk now. "These draft regulations represent a total rejection of the values held by the vast majority Americans: that we have a responsibility to protect imperiled species and the special places they call home," said Kate Freund, Legislative Associate at Earthjustice. According to several sources within the Fish and Wildlife Service quoted by Salon, hostility to the law within the agency has never been so intense. "I have 20 years of federal service in this and this is the worst it has ever been," one unnamed source is quoted as saying. In addition, the proposal would allow projects by the Forest Service and other agencies to proceed even if scientific evidence suggests that the projects might drive species to extinction so long as the rate of decline doesn't accelerate owing to the project. The Bush administration's antipathy to the law is shown by the numbers of species it has protected, in each case as the result of litigation -- 57. By comparison, 253 species were listed during the Reagan administration, 521 under Clinton, and 234 under Bush I. The administration reportedly had expected to reveal the new regulations in a few weeks. The draft regulations must be published in the Federal Register for public comment before they can become final, which is likely to be at least a year off. Contact: Jan Hasselman, Earthjustice, (206) 343-7340, ext. 25 |
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