OFF-ROAD VEHICLE ACTIVITY

ORV riders have increased seven-fold in less than 30 years. It is not just the exponential increase in riders that is creating problems on our public lands; the power and speed of ORVs have also multiplied, thus creating the potential for motorized access to previously inaccessible backcountry. The range, speed, noise and footprint of an ORV can cause substantial damage to wild, fragile ecosystems and have significant impacts on water quality, wildlife, and other users of the public lands who prefer quiet unspoiled landscapes.

 

Public land agencies at all levels – local, state and federal – are attempting to develop balanced and responsible management plans, but the agencies do not have the staff to monitor the vast lands impacted by motorized use, or to enforce the established rules. Thus, Great Old Broads for Wilderness has launched Broads Healthy Lands Project (BHLP), an objective, quantifiable ORV monitoring and database system to document all types of impacts to public lands travel corridors. Increased monitoring of our public lands is essential in order to provide land management agencies with accurate, thorough and reproducible information that they can use to create and enforce balanced, effective management plans. It is our hope that the data citizen volunteers collect along travel corridors, both baseline conditions and follow-up monitoring, will assist agencies in preserving our wild roadless public lands and the variety of benefits they provide for wildlife habitat, watershed protection, and quality recreational experiences.

For more information on Broads position on ORVs, click here.
To read about our ORV Successes click here.

What you can do to help with off-road vehicle activity on our public lands:

1. Become a volunteer and monitor ORV activity on your public lands. We have monitoring projects in many different geographical areas that you can help with.

2. Have you or someone you know stopped visiting places in Southern Utah due to too many ORVs? If yes, click here to use your experiences to stop the ORV invasion.

3. When visiting places, make sure businesses and agencies know that you prefer to recreate in places without ORVs. Ask business owners and agency personnel where you can hike on public lands without running into motorized vehicles.

4. Donate to Broads Healthy Lands Project

If you would like to donate to BHLP, please click on the button below to donate online, or if you would prefer to mail a check or money order, please print and mail our membership/donation form.

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