Rubicon Trail Easement and Resource Improvement Project DEIS available...
 

As much stuff I don't like in this doc (bad science continues), the suggested alternative doesn’t look too bad…
Alternative 3 responds to the issues of visual degradation from construction of the Buck Island Lake Outlet bridge and inadequately addressing human waste disposal by: hardening the crossing at Buck Island Lake Outlet, constructing 5 additional toilets, moving the toilet at Wentworth Springs Campground out of the Gerle Creek flood plain, including the short bypass at Little sluice, and reducing the access area at Little Sluice to 75 feet.

They look to be favoring hardening the Little Rubicon crossing downstream of the Buck Island Lake dam, and vetoing a bridge; constructing 5 additional toilets and moving the one that they built so poorly that it floods every damn year, and adding the short bypass at Little Sluice into their system roads inventory. The only thing I see that is questionable is reducing the access area at Little Sluice to 75 feet – this seems dumb considering how much more granite there is available, but the last few seasons of use since Route Designation where users paid little mind to USFS policy about distance from trail, well, you could see this limitation coming a mile away, the only questions I had was where they were going to measure from, how far they were going to allow, and how they plan to mark/sign it, then enforce it. You could almost speculate that by NOT adequately signing or enforcing the Route Dez restrictions, that USFS was trying to create/sustain the problem they intended to solve with this subsequent DEIS.

This could be a LOT worse, and we need to keep working on USFS to make sure the final article is better, and not worse. You KNOW the anti-access environmental elitists are tireless pushing their agenda from their angle…

Randii

Oh.
I forgot the link:
http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/eldorado/pro...on/index.shtml

I think that something to remember is how far we have come. If you said 10 years ago that the FS would take in to account and modify environmental documents to accommodate comments made by the OHV community, it would have been laughed at. Nowadays, that seems to be much different and is inspiring that we have gained a stake in the process. This is thanks to the dedication and countless hours of research done by many, many individuals that chose to never give up.

RTF will be going over this document and sending in comments. At the ROC meeting yesterday, the FS said that they know that there are some mistakes, things that are not right yet, but this document is a work in progress and they seem very willing to make good on things that are not quite right.

They have already made major changes to statements in the background portion where they discuss and describe the Rubicon, it's location, length and other seemingly minor details that we all know by heart.

I know this falls over the Holidays, but please try to make time to read the document and make comments on it before the 45 day comment period is up in mid to late January.

The harder fight will come in the agreement the County is willing to make and the variations that may inhibit our use of the trail. The good news in this is they are ADDING routes in at Buck Island for access to parking for camping as well as bathrooms.

This day has been a long time coming and I hate to say it but it is due in part to the efforts of those that we know want to close the trail. So, at the risk of playing nice, I would like to commend them for this small part in helping OHV to have a better level of responsibility on the Rubicon. This is definitely not over yet though. There are things being asked for that may not be good for us long term.

Scott

Like what?

The stuff in Alternative 5

Some of the new folks may not remember the festival of suck that was experienced during the development of the Rubicon Trail Master Plan, and how the anti-recreationists threw in every conceivable monitoring and enforcement item they could, until the whole thing damn near capsized under its own weight... luckily, the El Dorado County Board of Supervisors saw how expensive and impractical the plan would be to implement, and parked it on a shelf.

Some of the stuff here is directly reminiscent of that, or will be, if the elitist anti-recreationists' comments are rolled in. We've gotta make sure responsible recreation comments are thoughtful, well-considered, and at least as numerous as the muscle-powered missives.

Get to reading, folks! We need comments against such bad ideas as winter closure -- yep, it's in there.

Randii

That is the most depressing thing I have ever read.

All is lost.

Do not bother reading it. It is going to be what it is, what the forest service and RMK want.

We have no chance. We have no one who will fight.

Umm?

We're never lost unless we give up, IMHO.

Sure, we've got our work cut out for ourselves, but let's keep working on this together... please read and analyze the doc and make comments on it before the 45 day comment period ends.

Randii

Ya... I think I am gonna call BS on this. All the time we spend compromising is getting old. We need to stick to our guns. We have jumped through a lot of hoops and politics to keep this trail going, Why do we put up with these people? Can somebody just go in there and say NO this is not going to happen?
To much damn politics from the FS to the BOS to RTF. Will somebody speak in clear concise english for Gods sake??! No more giving in to this political BS.
Period. It's really simple It's a trail like thousand saround the country just alot cooler. People are getting educated and maintaining the trail. there is so much more crap that comes off of actual roadways into streams than this trail yet none of these enviro morons can't admit that or make the connection.
Sersiously.
SO I say from now on RTF, and the BOS and all that use this trail need to seriously say enough is enough. no more giving quarter. No more BS
speak english. Should we OCCUPY the FS and the KMR peoples places???
Hell I am unemployed I got time to Occupy some space...LOL!
Don;
't make me come down there and start bitch slapping people with a dead Golden Trout...I will do it don't tempt me..:D:laughing:

OK, I'll keep fighting for the trail!!!!!

NEPA is a big thing to understand. Most folks will look at it and say "F that, too much to do, too complicated". I think it may have been designed that way on purpose. No matter, if we have folks willing to go to bat and understand the process, we all win.

The thing to remember is that we want them to analyze all the stuff that CBD and the eco's put forth. Just analyzing something does not mean accepting or implementing. We also want them to analyze our stuff too. The quote above I just made in a post here and I believe it to be true!!

So, we want to see the "bad" stuff in there. If we don't have it in there, they'll sue because it was not in there, just like we can.

so again, thank you to everyone that has had a part in our successes!!!

Note the new "Wetlands" marked on the map. Note the Location of these "Wetlands":


http://i70.photobucket.com/albums/i8...onWetlands.jpg

IMHO - the FS has come up with the ultimate "lingo" to shut this trail down forever:

Here is a case that is being brought to the Supreme Court in January 2012 by the Pacific Legal Foundation.

Sackett Family Comments on EPA During Property Rights Forum - YouTube


And they did everything right. Their parcel is in a residential area – a platted subdivision – with sewer and water hookups. They obtained all the needed permits to begin building.

But when they began laying gravel, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency swooped in without warning. The Sacketts were told their land is “wetlands.”

They were ordered to return their property to EPA’s liking – on pain of $37,500 per day in fines!

Shocked, the Sacketts thought: There must be some mistake! They hired a soil expert and a biologist, who provided a certification that their parcel is not a wetland.

Mike and Chantell wanted to challenge the “wetlands” finding in court – but EPA (and the Ninth Circuit) said, No: They would have to restore their property (at a cost of tens of thousands of dollars), seek a “permit” (costing 12 times the purchase price of the land!), and bring a legal case when the permit was denied. Or, alternatively, they could violate EPA’s commands, and be hit with ruinous fines.

Watch this from Lou Dobbs

http://video.foxbusiness.com/v/1191105733001/

If this is the case on Private Property - you think Public Land, especially OHV's has a chance?

Little Sluice "Wetlands"??

It's called ECO TERRORISM..but it's done by Environuts in the NEPA. The Sooner we get Obama's people out the better. But it will not end there. The holier than thou attitude is what we are up against... So now one has to prove The lack of a "wetlands" to fight this. :mad3: SOS different verbage
I am game. I am going over this stuff as well and it boggles me the language used...Damn enviro lawyers...:mad3::mad3:

From the EPA's own Website:
http://water.epa.gov/type/wetlands/what.cfm

Those folks have a heck of a battle. Stopping the work without written authority or being of proper law enforcement personel the three individuals that tresspassed on the property are open to personal law suits. One instance where you say God Bless America for good attorneys.

Even better yet, prove that the "wetlands" are a result of OHV use. Considering there location and the USFS own words, N.O.I. pg. 3, "Water also collects in large puddles and depressions in many locations along the trail."

Add into that, the very quick recovery of the area closed by Wentworth Springs Campground and you have proof that the area can recover or adapt very quickly based on environmental stimuli.

Throw in the Rubicon has been around since sometime in the 1890's and it shows that his area has had more than enough time to adapt.

Couple of other issues that need addressed.

-petroleum products in the rivers
-what is the natural content of the surrounding areas due to shale oil? The Rockies are well known for vast deposits of shale oil.

-Copper and cadmium
-both are well known minerals in the Rockies and are both naturally occuring.

They are all well below EPA standards....well below.

Got this email 2 days ago. We are on the clock now. Start getting the comments in.
Jerry

The Notice of Availability (NOA) for the Rubicon Trail Easement and Resource Improvement Draft Environmental Impact Statement was published in the Federal Register today December 16, 2011. Our previous message listed the date as December 9, 2011. Please use December 16, 2011 for calculating the 45 day comment period which starts the day the NOA is published in the Federal Register. The NOA in the Federal Register contains the date that the comment period ends. If you have any questions please contact me at the address below.

Laura Hierholzer
NEPA Coordinator
Eldorado National Forest
(530) 642 5187
lhierholzer@fs.fed.us

I too am concerned about the "wetlands". Was it a "wetland" before these people decided to get involved and try to ruin out little bit of land we have?


I have been going over the maps and have slowly been reading the 400+ pages of the document. There are some good things to come out of it, but there are bad with it too.

DAMMIT! I just want to be able to go camping without these headaches. But, as I have learned, The more involved you get the MORE INVOLVED you get.

Comments Due in 10 Days!!!
 

OK, folks, we're kinda getting down to the wire. We (you) need to make comments to the Eldorado National Forest if we (you) want to affect the outcome of this process. This is certainly the biggest thing that has happened to the trail since the implementation of the CAO and the opportunity to get things like alternative routes and bathrooms if we want them.

RTF will be making comments (we’ve been reading and working on them since the NOI was out), but we will also take input here from folks who are interested and will integrate them if we can. EDIT: Remember that RTF is trying to make comments that are best for all trail users to maintain year around motor vehicle access to the trail (that's our mission!). If you want your comments to go in exactly as you intended them, they should be made directly to the forest. The forest must, by law, integrate your comment into the final EIS, or reply to your comment and say why they didn't integrate it.

I’ve attached a matrix that describes the alternatives for easier viewing, but would encourage all to look at the DEIS on the ENF web page and familiarize yourself with the alternatives (it’s a big document, at least try to read the alternatives, that’s where the meat is).

The ENF page is here: http://www.fs.fed.us/r5/eldorado/pro...on/index.shtml


Happy reading!

John Arenz

This is from an email list that I replied to:

This is from an email list that I replied to:

Ok Comments are in Brain hurts now, I'm glad I work at a winery

Only Five Days Left!!!
 

Yup, brain pain is the plan for sure.

Only five more days to get your comments in, get to writing!