Wilderness Watch is concerned about the Forest Service’s (FS) proposal to amend its Forest Plan in regards to wilderness trail management on the White Mountain National Forest (WMNF) in New Hampshire and Maine. The agency is trying to do the right thing by addressing trail issues in Wilderness, but instead should consider trails individually.
The WMNF has 150,000 acres of Wilderness—the Pemigewasset, Great Gulf, Presidential Range-Dry River, Wild River, Sandwich Range, and Caribou-Speckled Mountain. Moose, black bears, Canada lynx, fishers, beavers, coyotes, peregrine falcons, and bobcats call the mountains, hardwood and spruce-fir forests, and river valleys their home.
Wilderness on the WMNF has trailless zones, and the current Forest Plan requires wilderness trails to be within 1000-foot-wide trail corridors. Trailless areas protect plants and wildlife, keep Wilderness from being overrun by humans, and offer a primitive experience for those who venture there.
Despite the protection these trailless areas provide, the Forest Service is proposing to change its Forest Plan to allow trails—including possibly new, relocated, and user-created trails—outside of established trail corridors in Wilderness. This change could weaken protections throughout Wilderness on the WMNF.
Instead of amending the Forest Plan, the agency should make every effort to keep trails in Wilderness on the WMNF within trail corridors; should analyze wilderness impacts through site-specific NEPA analysis for new trails or trail relocations outside of trail corridors; and should complete all trail work in Wilderness using traditional skills and tools.
Photo: Pemigewasset Wilderness by Zack Porter, Standing Trees
