Is there a law or is that an opinion?

I would find it outrageous if dirtbiking is outlawed. I think the dirtbikers and snowmobilers are going to have to get organized; or these bureaucrats are going to makes us all criminals.

What’s next no river boats, and then they will ban fishing? The whole concept kinds of sounds vague and over controlling to me.

Are they talking everywhere and anyone’s judgement? Or specific locations for specific reasons for a defined type of disruption based on defined science. What about all the animals that benefit and use the dirt biking trails like deer and rabbits that feed the rest of the eco-system?

I'd like to know the law these people are operating under and what politicians are enabling that kind of sweeping powers over the freedom to use crown lands for recreation riding of sport vehicles.

DO it blatantly, get ticketted, and find out.

;-)

There is freedom to use reasonably without destroying the enivornment. There is freedom for virtually anything in measure ways so that one does not affect others or the things around them.

That has been a way the world has been operating for a long time.

Here’s the media release

http://www2.news.gov.bc.ca/news_releases_2005-2009/2007FOR0106-000964.htm

here are some pictures.

http://www.for.gov.bc.ca/pab/media/coleman/2007/07/26

Is this what you are interested in, having the freedom to cause such damage? If so, any business you want to draw up for tourists from parts of the world that respect the environment a bit more than that is pretty well gone.

BTW, remember dune buggies? No more. Now the dunes with some grass on them near sand beach shorelines and the typically sensitive region immediately behind are typically protected with elevated boardwalks bridging the footpaths from houses and parking lots to the sand beaches. All those beaches I used to frequent when I was a little kid just do not look the same anymore.

Freedom? or protection of what we have for future generations of people and local flora and fauna?
http://www.fhwa.dot.gov/environment/wildlifeprotection/images/AL_boardwalk-550.jpg

http://www.co.nueces.tx.us/pw/dunes/images/episcopalboardwalk.jpg

Ask Dan Strider what he thinks about mudbogging.

http://www.strideradventures.ca

"I would find it outrageous if dirtbiking is outlawed."

Dirt bikes and ATVs are outlawed on residential streets and sidewalks: still, they can be encountered regularly being driven at excessive speeds on streets and sidewalks in the Hart Highlands.

Illegal and very dangerous, especially after dark.

Obviously, their disrespect for rules and laws is ubiquitous and one hates to think what havoc they wreak on the environment once off the streets and out of public view!

Ban them, the sooner the better!

IMO I agree with Chadermando, is this everywhere and anyone's judgement?
What a load of crap...who is going to police this?
If I jump on the quad, oh and just happen to go thru a puddle, disturb the water and mud, am I going to be fined or thrown in jail for having a little fun? I quess in my defense in court, I could say that I was actually performing an enviromentally friendly act or people friendly act by destroying thousands of mosquito larvae that wouldn't be hatching!!!! LOL
What will they come up with next??????

It's about time those that screw up the roads and trash trails and 4X4 up the creeks are held responsible for the mud flows and erosion.
I own a sled and a quad and I make sure neither one has any impact on the land. But some people are total idiots and this will help get their attention. Plus it gives the rest of us the right to get those idiots out of the bush.
Organized mud bog OK, mud bog a pipeline R/O go to jail.
If this is what it takes for our sport to survive, no problem. This legislation won't effect any of the riding I have done for the last 35 years, and doesn't change any of our plans for the coming decades of riding.
Join a club and protect what we have. Tabor Mtn offers some excellent clean rides.

Tabor mountain is all about riding big rock gravel and swamps. Half the trails on Tabor mountain are swamp infested. Good for 4-wheelers and sleds in the winter, but not dirt bikes.

It looks like they are going after anybody that kicks up a little bit of dirt. Look at the examples used on the government web site. Its a grassy hill with a little bit of dry dirt exposed and they call it 10,000 years worth of damage even though the last ice age only ended 12,000 years ago and we have dirt exposed trails like that in our parks from people walking on the grass.

This is a law that gives arbitrary power to ruin a persons life, if they are fast enough to catch you, for doing nothing less then riding a ridgetop trail. It has nothing to do about responsible riding. It has everything to do with removing recreation from the woods for a bunch of fundamentalist 'save the grass' type environmentalist. They want to be the only ones allowed into whole areas like the Kakwa Park, which is now completely off limits to all recreation users.

Meanwhile the big forest companies continue to clear cut; the oil and rail companies threaten whole watersheds; and 99.9999% of the province never even gets touched by the ribbon of the off road recreation trails. Most people I ride with don't hunt and actually report poachers and violators of the land, but now we will all be criminals just for being out there.

Its bad enough we have the language tribunals and anti-free speech laws that have proliferated in Canada the last ten years. Anyone can complain that they don't like what you said or where you road and suddenly your a criminal even if you spoke the truth or were riding on a donkey trail that has been there for a 100 years. No need for the courts or the right of presumed innocence. It’s the policy of this liberal government to act in anyway they seem fit and citizens are only allowed to debate their decisions after the fact (i.e. BC Rail sale, land use planning, and now a back door stab in the back to the legitimate riding public.

When did we get rid of common law and switch to code edicts of guilty until proven innocent or these new alternate approval processes passed by bureaucrats?

How about that pair of Owls that live in the trees along Edgewood pit. Are they going to shut down that pit. I don't think so. How about the pair of owls and rare woodpeckers across where the new golf club is going in where the city plans to log later this year. Will they be protected, I don't think so. What about the salmon run in Tabor Creek or the eagle nest that was harrassed by poachers on the Nechako? They were not protected and a real difference could have been made in all those cases and many more that are reported by recreational users patroling the backwoods. Nope save the grasss let the elite do all the damage they want and fine a regular guy a $100,000 simply for enjoying the great outdoors.

Snitches will be everywhere who got something against people enjoying the outdoors....

I will never ever ever vote for another liberal the rest of my life. Every recreational rider should think long and hard about what the liberals have done to your freedom to ride a recreational toy.

“I hope this new legislation will stop people from harming the environment by mudbogging or recklessly driving ATVs through sensitive alpine terrain and range lands,” said Coleman. “We want to encourage the public to act responsibly on Crown land when they go out and enjoy the great outdoors.”

Chad, surely you can't be objecting to the above statement?

If you do then it wouldn't matter who brought this policy in, be it Liberal, NDP or your very own party - you may as well stay home on election day.

Everybody knows that the vast majority of environmental damage is caused by industry. This is just another thinly-veiled attempt to point the finger at the little guy, and perhaps squeeze a few more dollars out of his wallet, assuming there are any in there to begin with.

We need money for the 2010 Olympics and we need to raise a huge amount of revenue somehow, without visibly raising taxes.

The most honorable way to do that is to fine bad people for doing bad things.

What if there just isn't enough bad people doing bad things to raise the kind of money needed ?

Then expand or widen the definition of "what is a bad person ?" and "what is a bad thing ?".

You are guaranteed, at some point, to include the majority of the population in one respect or another.

That means you get a $150 to $500 donation per person, per year, to the 2010 Olympic fundraising effort, depending on how many heinous, minor infractions you commit in a year.

Seatbelts, car seats, dog restraints, etc. All honorable causes for sure, but the fines for each went up around the same time that "more enforcement" is announced.

Expect soon, that if you don't live your life absolutely perfectly, absolutely every day, that you will be another kind donor to the effort one way or the other.

I agree with the spirit of the legislation, but there will likely be only a few instances where people cause this magnitude of damage, it's not like it happens every day.

So then, we have to include the scratch marks on the ground, and the tracks in the snow, and the ripples in the water....eventually reaching the point where someone is out there with a microscope, trying to detect any environmental damage whatsoever.

If the penalty for this is enforced and blah, blah, blah, like every other law in this province, I am sorry to say, but tis to laugh. But then again, car thieves have no money to pay fines, but taxpaying off roaders have money. Aye!~There's the rub. Go after Joe Taxpayer. He has the dough. Not real broke thieves. Ha ha ha . I roll my eyes. More lucre in fining speeding drivers than busting a crackshack. Follow the money.

" Posted by: Chadermando on July 28 2007 12:51 PM
I will never ever ever vote for another liberal the rest of my life. Every recreational rider should think long and hard about what the liberals have done to your freedom to ride a recreational toy..."

Hey Chadermando, you like Kakwa? Well you can thank the Liberals that we can still go there. The NDP just about closed the door on that Park and what the NDP set in motion was almost impossible to derail. Thanks to some good work by the local Liberals we were able to retain access to most of the Park. Last year was a trial run on the new deal and this year we should get more area to ride.
You want to help? Our club got money from BC Parks to put in a bridge across the Buchanan Creek. Come on out and cook for us this fall while we put it in. Or round up some big stick iron and come on out and help.

Yama, actually I haven't been out there in years. I don't own a sled anymore and my bike wouldn't have the range. Kakwa is a place were a person feels free and the last thing they want is a person with a rule book chasing behind them. Not that you're going to break laws, it is just the whole principle of it. Peer pressure with the aid of public signage as a third party authority is a far greater motivator rather then the threat to destroy a persons life with a $100,000 fine hanging over their heads just for turning a tire on the wrong piece of grass.

I think I know the creek your talking about, keep us all informed and I’ll see what I’m up to when the time comes. I can’t make plans that far in advance right now.

This new law like reasonableman says can be interpreted right down to the ripple in the water; meaning in effect we are all potential criminals no matter how small our infraction given the hypothetical and interpretation of some future vigilantly who wants to have personal silence in the forest or some other ulterior nutcase vendetta.

It is a lazy law that fits the pattern of making everything illegal and then sort out the circumstances latter when enforcement is funded and the accused party is already declared guilty.

A much better law would be one that enabled reasonable measures to protect researched direct habitat in a way that facilitates the unique nature of each situation. Specific guidelines would be drawn up for specific areas based on interface density as to where problem areas occur and how to mitigate first through education via signage and then through direct enforcement of specific cases of egregious violators.

Putting tax collectors on the trails that connect our backcountry is akin to putting armed guards on our street corners and is as un-Canadian a thing as I can think of.

How much longer until these trial cops are linked up with Homeland Security and they start making you show a passport at their checkpoints?

well, my thoughts. I'm a person of middle age, lived in the area all of my life. Have driven around the bush many times. we have the power and ability to destroy all of what is natural in the next 40 years if we choose too. Or we can respect the world that we live in, and lead by example.

Why not make it law that every ATV sold in the province must have a GPS monitoring system on it. Thus it makes it easier to track if it is stolen or is being operated in a environmentally sensitive area. Some would say its too 1984. But look at our drivers licence. Is it our right to have a our licence, no it is a privilage in which we have to respect the responsibility. The will of the government is there to protect the environment, it is now the choice of the people willing to embrace it.

Put a GPS on it, It is registered to an owner, thus he is responsible for it. On all models between 2003 to 2007, the government offers a $50.00 voucher to have it installed.

All ATV's, dirt bikes, snowmobile's etc has to be registered no different than a motorvehicle. The operator has to have a permit to use the equipment, and it has to be renewed each year for $25.00, to cover cost and fund the environmental cause.

Any equipment caught in transit without a GPS unit, and with valid permit will be fined $200. All fines are paid out at the time of renewing the permit.

Any unit with out a valid permit will be confiscated and deemed stolen until proven otherwise.

Too 1984, well the few that are wrecking out backwoods, and we all know who they are. Hold them responsible for being too redneckish.

We have the ability to destroy our green province, or perserve it. Its the will of the people that is going to decide our fate.

When you say "He speaks" are you talking about Big Brother ?

I agree, it's 1984 epitomised.

You are looking at this under a microscope. As I said, the number of infractions are minimal. It is not a large scale problem, and not one worth such a large scale effort.

Deal with the ones that need to be dealt with and leave the rest of us hard working folk to enjoy our much-earned and much-needed leisure time.

Very few people cause this kind of damage.

Deal with the idiot, instead of just treating everybody like idiots.

to the reasonable man,

I do agree with you that it is only the few that are the rednecks, and care for nothing more than their own needs. However how can you prove it. You can't afford to have a person outthere 24/7 with a camera and etc. We have the technology, to nail these people to the wall with the damage.

If the person charged claims it was loaned out to some one else, than identify that person. If it was stolen, check it out on the GPS satelite to identify location prior to contacting the individual.

The problem, is that these idiots out there also have rights that needs to be protected, unless we have sufficient evidence to nail them. Take their ATV's, their homes, just leave them with one vehicle so that they can earn a living still. But we need to get the message thru.

"As I said, the number of infractions are minimal. It is not a large scale problem, and not one worth such a large scale effort."

Large scale effort? I did not realize they are setting up a new unit of conservation officers specializing in this area. To me this is simply a matter of someone finding signs of current, repeated recreation activity which is destructive in nature, observing the location on a weekend, and giving anyone found there participating in those activities a ticket.

In fact, it will likely be virtually 100% complaint driven by responsible users of the “woods” who can now report activity with some identifying information and the MoE can take action if they wish to. Previously it was not impossible to do so, but more difficult to do so. So, it is not even a “new law”. It is simply that it has been picked up by the Forest and Range Act as well.

They have changed the law so that it covers everyone in the "woods" rather than only those who are out there for "industrial" purposes. Simple.

I suspect that the reason that they have done it is because of the nature of the damage that has been seen. While forestry workers could certainly do the damage depicted in the images provided, the likelihood is that it is not in most cases.

So, realizing that there are others who are beginning to cause damage, they have changed the law.

Our lifestyles are changing. We are not doing today what we did 30 years ago. It is not uncommon to see someone driving with those ridiculous looking standard chassis trucks on tires used for some type of heavy equipment and requiring a parachute to jump out of to the ground. And every now and then one sees one with an inch of dried mud caked all over the vehicle. It’s a status symbol, whether they go mud bogging in sensitive wilderness areas or along the ditches along roads such as Tyner, or whether they throw mud at it to make it look like that.

With changing lifestyles come changing laws. As I said, the previous version of a similar thing was the dune buggies made from converted VWs. Laws had to be created for them as well.

Lifestyles and laws associated with them are a shifting relationship. As lifestyles change, and the unforeseen outcomes become negative to the society art large, laws are eventually passed when educating the public does not help.

It is normally the few who eventually make it difficult for the many. Laws based on that simple fact fill a library and keep the courts and legal profession in business.

This is the type of place mud bogging belongs: http://flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=359826917&size=l

Not in places such as this: http://flickr.com/photo_zoom.gne?id=449878826&size=l

I'm not worried about the mud bogging. It makes a lot of sense not to destroy watering holes for wildlife.

Where I have a problem is that I have an addiction for extreme hill climbing. Its something in my blood from childhood and I will never stop even if they take all my money away and throw me in prison. I can see someone that doesn’t like me staking out my activities and reporting when I ride so as to cause problems for me due to reasons that have nothing to do with riding. First they came for the Jews, then the Gypsies, and what will you do when they come for you. Its why the law needs to be specific and none of this 1984 nazi crap.

Hill climbing kicks up dirt and some say it causes erosion, which it does to a minor extent on the small ribbon of countryside one rides on. Hill climbing erosion is small in the scar it leaves on the landscape and has absolutely no proven negative balance effect on the environment, but it does sometimes bother people with the noise it makes. Its the people with noise issues that will rat out through government fink lines and broad undefined legislation the guy that just wants to get to the top of a hill to enjoy the view from the top. Those complaints will have nothing to do with at risk species or pretty grass issues, but everything to do with restricting other people recreation based on noise pollution.

Its all about noise nazi's and nothing about specific environmental concerns.

Okay, time ot lie down on the couch and tell me all about your mother and how she treated you when you were little boy Chad.

;-)

"Large scale effort? I did not realize they are setting up a new unit of conservation officers specializing in this area."

I was responding to another poster's idea of putting a GPS on every vehicle, not commenting on the story.

See what happens when you stray off topic ??

I have since decided, though, that they should just install GPS transmitters in our heads, and they can come right down from the sky and get us, any time we think a bad thought.

That's much more efficient solution.

Too much paranoia on this board! Too many cry babies. "mommy, mommy, the big bad man is gonna take my toy away!"

;-)

Shut up Owl, I heard that....

:-)

Owl, too many cry babies? Seems like you post more material than anyone. Heehee!

YDPC - with material such as is available on this board, I just find it too hard to resist.

;-)

From the Edmonton Journal .....

This guy wants to take some more freedoms away from ATV drivers. Will it ever stop?

"In the wake of the weekend death of a 13-yearold boy while driving an all-terrain vehicle (ATV), an Edmonton spinal cord surgeon is renewing his call for a ban on people under the age of 16 driving quads and for the licensing of all quad drivers.

For the past five years, Dr. Mitch Lavoie, an ATV owner himself, has been pushing Alberta government ministers to help limit the rising carnage from ATV accidents, but has yet to get any response.

“We can’t ban ATVs, but there is absolutely a need for regulation and training,” he says. “People should have to have training, and it’s not as though this is something that is completely and totally new for us. We’ve got driving courses for driving, and boating courses for boating, and courses for motorcycles. Why not ATVs?”

Already this summer, Lavoie, a University Hospital surgeon, has operated on two or three people whose backs were broken in ATV accidents. The vehicles are now the second leading cause of fractured spines in the province after other motor vehicles, taking over from horses, Lavoie says."

http://www.canada.com/edmontonjournal/news/story.html?id=9eb9453b-42d9-45f7-963a-1129fac52e75&k=6147

Excellent...nice to have some teeth for the very few conservation officers to charge the environmental idiots. I'm sick to death of watching drunken drivers in 4X4's and ATV's driving THROUGH Salmon Valley river at the public spots....smashing their beer bottles and leaving everything from McDonalds garbabe to dirty diapers. I hardly see this as "Big Brother 1984"...I see this as a necessary step because some of us humans are a bit mentally retarded and need some guidance.

I think the whole thing stems from the naming of the vehicle - ATV - All Terrain.

More proper terminology should be STV - Some Terrain, both from an environmental point of view and a simple machine capacity point of view.

;-)

I agree there are a lot of idiots out at Salmon Valley smashing bottles and such and that is an excellent example of a situation where it would be good to have specific laws protecting a specific habitate by a specific type of harm.

Harm being ATV's in the river during spawning, and bottles being allowed on the beach.Put signs up for the specific concerns and fine the hell out of violators. I'm all for that and have long advocated that.

Making everyone everywhere illigal is not the answer though for location specific problems.