...we
are not in jeopardy of losing our trails due to letting them know about the
motorcycles. In fact, they GAVE me the number and insisted we call immediately
because they not only know there is a safety aspect for the "allowed" users of
that trail, but they also tear up the environment there as well. Another
aspect is that there are very expensive homes up above the lake and the last
thing they all want is accidents, messed up trails and
noise...
Clearly, I have failed to make myself understood. Speaking too
generally, to
a post that was about a specific problem at a specific park. I am not
saying
"Kathie is wrong. Do not call to report rogue ATVers!!"
The point I am making is that, from a 40,000 foot, Machiavellian
perspective,
badly-behaving ATVers serve a useful purpose. If they didn't
exist to act
as the top priority item on land managers' and militant
environmentalists
and hikers' control and eradication list, it would be useful to invent
them.
The rest of the points I made about the maneuvering and coalition
forming and dissolving that has gone on and that is continuing to go
on in *national* trail politics among the OHVers, as represented by
their
industry-sponsored advocacy group the Blue Ribbon Coalition; the
hikers
as represented by the American Hiking Society and the Appalachian
Trail Conservancy; the mountain bikers as represented by the
International
Mountain Bike Association; and the equestrians, as represented
by nobody in particular except the American Horse Council a little
bit and the Backcountry Horsemen of America, to the extent that
it can afford to; are important for horsemen to understand.
The mistake horsemen have made with the OHVer's Blue Ribbon Coalition
is to have allowed the Blue Ribbon Coalition to claim to act on their
behalf.
This has made it easier for hostile land managers, environmentalists,
and anti-horse recreation interests to lump horses in with Off
Highway
Vehicles as "Just as bad as an ATV." [Region 1 Tennessee Wildlife
Resources Agency Director to the TWRA Commission in September, 2005,
justifying his office's collusion with the Cherokee National Forest
to
restrict horses to designated trails only.]
If you truly live next to a public park where the historic right of
horsemen
to recreate is in no jeopardy, then you live in my idea of
Nirvanah. Either
