News Releases: 2007
[Image]. Forest Service Shield.
News Release

USDA Forest Service

Shasta-Trinity National Forest

Contact: Alec Lawton
(530) 226-2345
Forest Service to host Route Designation Workshop

REDDING, Calif. (July 1Cool - The Shasta-Trinity National Forest will host a series of workshops to share draft Travel Management/Off-Highway Vehicle (OHV) inventory maps with the public and provide instructions for providing input. Once completed, the inventory will serve as the basis for future Travel Management Planning.
Workshop Times and Locations

* August 9 - Mt. Shasta Community Center, 629 Alder Street, Mt. Shasta, CA 96067 - 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

* August 10 - Trinity County Fairgrounds, South Highway 3, Hayfork, CA 96041 - 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

* August 13 - Forest Headquarters, 3644 Avtech Parkway, Redding, CA 96002 - 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

* August 15 - Trinity Public Utilities District Building, Industrial Park, 26 Ponderosa Lane, Weaverville, CA 96093 - 7 p.m. to 9 p.m.

More information about the Travel Management/ OHV Route Designation Process is available on our web site. For those unable to attend one of the workshops, draft maps and instructions for providing input will also be available on our web site at www.fs.fed.us/r5/shastatrinity.

Just got back from the Cal4 North meeting today. I checked around and found this and then came on here and what do you know. I talked to them about a month or so ago and they couldn't hardly tell me anything at all, and now this. Well, it looks like after today's Cal4 meeting, I'll be attending all of these that I can humanly get to and making some phone calls into the local business's and organizations to find contacts in those area's. This way we might be able to get as many people there as possible right off the bat.

Thanks for posting this in it's own thread. There aren't any nationally known trails is our area, but it's still something that they are trying to take from us, as a whole.

If anyone has advice about what to start doing right away to try and get a step ahead, please feel free to chime in.

Thank you,
Aaron

If anyone has advice about what to start doing right away to try and get a step ahead, please feel free to chime in.

Thank you,
Aaron

Aaaron,

I too was at that Sacramento meeting, reporting on Lassen N.F., and we are about 6 months ahead of Shasta-T.

If there is anything I'd advise, that we didn't do well enough, was energize the support base very early. Find the "persons of influence" in each of the disciplines M/C - ATV - snowmobiles - mountain bikers - fisherman - hunters and get all of them, and as many key "leaders" of your own groups as possible, and ATTEND as many of the workshops as time allows. Get the facts, find the forms and maps online, get them printed out, and distributed heavily to all of the disciplines, and get the broadest base, early, to get your desired routes that are either not on the maps from the workshops, and add as many that your base knows of, and get the forms in on time, and with great detail as to WHY each route is important.

I can send you the feedback form that came out of Lassen after the deadline, and the review of our input forms as to what they liked and what didn't work.

Call me anytime, and I can help you, as I'm wearing the scars of not getting enough nor the broadest base early enough into phase two, that you are now entering, we moved into phase 3 and wish I knew what I now know.

Ken

Aaaron,

I too was at that Sacramento meeting, reporting on Lassen N.F., and we are about 6 months ahead of Shasta-T.

If there is anything I'd advise, that we didn't do well enough, was energize the support base very early. Find the "persons of influence" in each of the disciplines M/C - ATV - snowmobiles - mountain bikers - fisherman - hunters and get all of them, and as many key "leaders" of your own groups as possible, and ATTEND as many of the workshops as time allows. Get the facts, find the forms and maps online, get them printed out, and distributed heavily to all of the disciplines, and get the broadest base, early, to get your desired routes that are either not on the maps from the workshops, and add as many that your base knows of, and get the forms in on time, and with great detail as to WHY each route is important.

I can send you the feedback form that came out of Lassen after the deadline, and the review of our input forms as to what they liked and what didn't work.

Call me anytime, and I can help you, as I'm wearing the scars of not getting enough nor the broadest base early enough into phase two, that you are now entering, we moved into phase 3 and wish I knew what I now know.

Ken

Awesome, thanks Ken. I'm sure that I'll be in contact with you. I've already sent off a few emails to friends in the Mt. Shasta area. I'll make some phone calls on Monday. The best part is probably the customer base that my trailer business has. We have sold trailers all over this Northern California area and I know at least a few people in all the area's.

Aaron

Aaron,

Here is some "homework" for you.

Here is the page that (scantily) describes the process in Shasta-T

http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/shastatrinity/news/ohv/index.shtml

Here is the document that every forest is supposed to follow in doing route dez. It is called Route Designation Guidebook, and is a 156 page document (.pdf), online at:

http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/routedesignation/pdfs/rd-guidebook.pdf

I printed this one out, highlighted stuff I didn't know, and flagged those pages, and re-read them a few more times. If we don't know the rules, we can't adequately play the game.

This one is only 9 pages and has some clues:

http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/routedesignation/pdfs/guidance-for-parking-dispersed_camping-big_game.pdf

A bit of useful stuff here:

http://www.fs.fed.us/recreation/programs/ohv/

In the above you will find references to the OHV grant program being able to be used by the forests, (to the tune of $2M a year to Region 5) and clues to their use of the G-Y-R system.
That has to do with the soils and water surveys you will see after the next step. Green=good, and able to be funded.
Yellow=needs work, but possibly fund-able
Red=closure at Sup'r discretion

I have a document: Off-Highway Motor Vehicle Recreation (OHMVR) Division Grants and Cooperative Agreements Program Grant Program Manual which I found online, but likely due to the turmoil of whether we will have a program because of SB 742 I couldn't find you an url. Why this is relevant is that if a forest can grade everything G or (maybe) Y, it "could" be funded for repair and maintenance, Reds are possibly closed.

I'm getting you ahead in the program of Route Dez, but forewarned is forearmed. And will apply to EVERY Forest in the country, in this process, all on different schedules. - so this may have relevancy in other Forests. Route Dez *IS* coming to your Forest. !

If you want to know more on the G Y R and the man who wrote the rules, and then is being hired by some Western forests to grade them - call me. That part sucks! Not going to post that here.

Ken