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Land battle heats up dunes
GLAMIS, CALIF.
When they look out across the largest sand dunes in North America, Jeneiene and Daniel Patterson see paradise. The 45-by-15-mile sprawl of granulated humps is a botanical Eden. Ironwood, smoke trees, and desert buckwheat provide a happy, if hot, habitat for flitting songbirds, darting lizards, stalking puma, and lumbering tortoises.
"This is a biological wonderland," says Mr. Patterson, a desert ecologist with theTucson, Ariz.-based Center for Biological Diversity. "It's one of the last, great bastions of habitat for endangered species in the world."
But Bob Matthews and Mark Hopkins look at these same dunes and see a different paradise stadium-sized sand bowls skeined with trails perfect for off-road racing and motorcycle jumping, and flat areas for family camping. "This is a one-of-a-kind experience," says Mr. Matthews, an off-road vehicle enthusiast for 30 years. "It's one of the last, great places to find a roller coaster that you have control of."
Perennially at odds over the best and proper use of public land, the two views are clashing anew over the 140,000-acre Imperial Sand Dunes Recreation Area. In a move being watched by off-roaders and conservationists nationwide for clues to where the Bush administration is headed on land-use issues, federal officials want to reopen thousands of acres of dunes that had been closed just two years ago.
Under a temporary agreement between off-road clubs, the federal Bureau of Land Management (BLM), and conservation groups, a 49,000-acre area was closed off in the summer of 2000 over concern about damage to endangered plants and animals.
Environmental groups say reopening the closed section would reverse years of progress in habitat restoration. While welcoming more land to play on, all-terrain-vehicle (ATV) clubs are wary that the new policy could create curfews and vehicle limits.
"We're trying to provide balance between conservationists and recreation groups," says Roxy Trost, a spokesperson for the BLM, which regulates the area.
The dunes have become the battleground between several factions on both sides of the argument in recent years because of the growing swarms of ATVers who converge here on major holiday weekends up to 250,000 by some estimates.Besides increased concern over habitat destruction, there are health and safety problems blamed on lack of adequate law enforcement when the crowds arrive.
On major holiday weekends, this place resembles a scene from the "Mad Max" road warrior movies. Thousands of helmeted, blackbooted riders wearing plastic body armor gun their two- three- and four-wheeled machines up, down, and around hundreds of trails. There are no traffic rules just loose, right-of-way protocols known as "dune etiquette." Spurred by violence such as stabbings and shootings the BLM has asked eight federal and state agencies to help restore order.
"There have been serious, ongoing law enforcement issues since 1996 because no one has ever established the proper carrying capacity of this land," says Karen Schambach, California director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, which has been working with federal rangers to publicizes some of the law enforcement issues.
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