A congressman from North Carolina says there's no need for more ORV regulations at Cape Lookout National Seashore/Kurt Repanshek
A draft plan aimed at managing off-road vehicles at Cape Lookout National Seashore has been severely criticized by a congressman, who said there's no justification to either charge an $80 permit fee or restrict where ORVs can go on the national seashore.
Seashore officials released their draft ORV management plan earlier this year. Under the preferred alternative, ORVs would be able to travel most of Cape Lookout; the plan also would create three seasonal "pedestrian only" areas on the seashore. The proposed Cape Lookout National Seashore Off-Road Vehicle Management Plan/Environmental Impact Statement aims to put specific numbers to ORV traffic, specify where they can travel, formally set speed limits, and set seasons for when they can travel on the seashore.
But Rep. Walter B. Jones, in a letter sent to the seashore a month after the comment period closed, said the "restrictions" contained in the preferred alternative would "impose significant economic hardship on the local economy and are totally unnecessary to protect species of concern."
Under the proposed alternative, efforts to provide pedestrian only access during the summer months would cause the mileage open to ORVs to seesaw just a bit: 44 of the seashore's 56 miles would be open to ORVs from March 16 "through the Thursday preceding Memorial Day and from the day after Labor Day through December 15." Forty-one of those miles "would be available for ORV use from the Friday preceding Memorial Day through Labor Day. Routes within the Cape Lookout Village Historic District would be open to through vehicle traffic."
In his two-page letter, the Republican congressman said the Park Service seems to be searching for a solution to a problem that doesn't exist. Visitation to Cape Lookout has been on the decline, Rep. Jones pointed out, and additional regulations will own continue that downward spiral.
"The proposed permits, fees, and other access restrictions in Alternative C all but invite visitors to vacation elsewhere," he wrote. "American's hard-earned tax dollars already pay for the operation of the seashore; they shouldn't be charged an additional fee to access it."
Back in 2013 Rep. Jones introduced legislation that would force Cape Hatteras National Seashore to discard its court-approved ORV management plan and return to an interim plan adopted in 2007. The measure stalled in the House.
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Comments
Another classic example of NPS looking for a solution where no problem exists. There have been many lessons learned but already forgotten by NPS with the same approach used at Cape Hatteras National SEashore Recreational Area as they want for Cape Lookout. The real travesty is that this seashore is closed to all access 3 months of the year when some of the best bird watching, shelling, fishing and relaxation are available anywhere on the East Coast.
NPS has systematically removed the American public for their parks across the nation using these same approach which is unwarranted and unwanted. This reduction in access to our Parks and Seashores has to stop!
"Under the preferred alternative, ORVs would be able to travel most of Cape Lookout; the plan also would create three seasonal "pedestrian only" areas on the seashore."
The plan doesn't sound unreasonable or draconian. Certainly not worth the heavy breathing that putting comments in boldface would indicate.
This plan and one forced on CHNSRA only seem reasonable to those that have never visited. You outsiders don't understand the impact to culture, tradition and economy of the local communities. It is only a checkbox of feel good regulations to the outsiders. At CHNSRA these regulations have done nothing to protect or improve the resources. The only accomplishment of the new regulations are lower visitation, added beaurcracy, increased management costs, reduced access and hurt local economy. The OBX Group NPS has so lost their way, that they proposed eliminating beach lifegaurds in favor of interpretive rangers. This move deepened the wedge between the NPS and communities it promised to support.
Southeasterners are some of the laziest people on the planet. If they can't get there by gas, it's simply a threat on their freedom to live a life free of exercise!
Ah, the bigotry comes out.
Thing is, they have the freedom to live life as they wish.
Well it's true and the statistics prove it. They rank high in obesity, poverty, and their school systems rank as some of the lowest in the country. BUT it's christian, REPUBLICAN and proud, and will someday rise again when they feel an effort to get off the couch!
Live in this region and see it for yourself. And beachdumps comments prove a lot about how he feels about government. He loves him some gubermint when the teet suckling is good, but hates it when it dries up. The NPS mission is not about supporting local communities - it's about protecting a place of natural or cultural significance. He expects the government to provide for him and his business. Such, atypical hypocrisy.
"Thing is, they have the freedom to live life as they wish."
But just as we can't force our lifestyle on them, they shouldn't try to force in on us. The same goes for the ORV crowd, the mountain bike club, the wilderness seekers, the seekers of luxury accomodations, the extreme environmentalists AND the extreme anti-environmentalists.
We zone our cities to try to find balances between residential, industrial uses, businesses, parks and open spaces and other valid uses of the land. Why is trying to do the same with our national parks any different?
Why is there such a loud cry of MY WAY ONLY -- ALL OR NOTHING from so many people who are supposed to be adults?
Could it be the American Entitlement Mentality at work among the less mature or reasonable among us?
Gee Gary, I thought you had me on ignore. In fact, if I remember you quit the whole blog.
And that is because they are lazy? There might not be any other reason?
Agreed - and noone is forcing you to ride a bike or an ORV. Nor are they preventing you from walking. If anyone is screaming for the "MY WAY ONLY -- ALL OR NOTHING" its the Wilderness absolutists.
This is a reasonable compromise, to all but the lazy. This congressman should be ashamed for simply being a lazy american and promoting an even lazier america. Hoorray for the continual decline into a full blown idiocracy. All praise the lazy!
Sorry Gary - people have the right to be "lazy" if they want to. But then ORVs at Cape Lookout have nothing to do with "lazy".
Gary, I don't have a business anywhere near either these parks and never taken a government handout or subsidy, like I'm sure you have. I have family roots to these islands and care deeply about my friends that live there. They are suffering at the hands of moronic people like yourself that have no understanding of the area. I have walked miles to many parts of these islands and glady share my walks with responsible ORV drivers. Your bigoted attacks glarinly show the left wing ignorant intolerance to anything but thier view.
Or the folks who want ALL the beach open to ORVs, or those who want ALL the forest and park trails open to bikes, or those who want ALL the roads to be paved, or those who want ALL the services provided free, or . . . . or . . . . (and the list goes on ad infinitum)
Note that in my post asking for reasonableness on all sides, I was careful to point to the extremes on both ends when I asked for nothing more than an adult, sensible consideration of seeking compromise.
But to those infected with the Great American Entitlement Mentality, that is a completely foreign concept.
Excuse me, but I need to head for the gym to join a large number of others who have found themselves overweight and/or afflicted with something called age who are trying to do something about it. We may be old and fat, (although I prefer the word chubby) but at least we're not lazy.
Oh - you mean like all those folks that claim man has no impact on earth? You couldn't name one of them and I am guessing you can't name anyone that meets the description above either.
like I'm sure you have
moronic people
Is it fair to suggest that Your bigoted attacks glarinly show the right wing ignorant intolerance to anything but thier view.
Thanks for a good laugh this morning.
Now how about trying to seek workable solutions that lie somewhere between the ignorant left wing and the equally ignorant right wing?
Probably hopeless, but I do think we should try . . .
Wrong. I've never once been on welfare or taken a handout. I've been employed and have had projects and work since I exited college with my degrees. And seriously beach, you're too cowardly to post under your own name, so I don't believe most of what you say. You behave like your every move is under threat by what the govenment does at the Cape Hatteras, and it's fairly pathetic. How about EDUCATING YOU and your family to do something else so that don't have to rely on the every whims of Cape Hatteras! But I know that might be tough. That might require being "influenced" from the scary outside world!
I have family roots that worked in steel mills. The mills are decaying and being torn down, and replaced with tech and biotech industries. I can look at the past in pictures but don't feel an urge to fight to keep the old steel mills standing so they can still make steel. Maybe, because the culture that i'm from realized that the future wasnt going to be in steel, so they educated their kids to do something else. The past is just that - the past. The parochial types tend to hang on to it like it's still the future.
Congrats for once walking a mile. I'm sure that was a tough day in your life. Nothing is truly remote in the CHNS.... You want remote, go trek in Alaska, or the Northern Rockies and get back to me about "how tough you have it" when you have to walk less than a mile.. Boy you guys truly are the epitome of lazy over there in the OB.
Well, let's see, there's that one who calls himself ec or something like that . . . .
But he'll deny it.
See ya at the gym.
We did try to find workable solutions, the enviros didn't want negotiate or compromise. Then the NPS played comment, studies game and ignored us, and implemented thier predetermined plan. We have lost faith in the NPS to do the fair thing, that's why we are attempting to go around them in congress and courts.
Well, I and quite a few others that I know provided comments on that plan asking that wilderness for most of the park be considered. You think that you and the rest of the parochial deadbeats over there in the OB are the only one that commented on this plan? LOL!
Of course I will - because it never happened. But then you are accustomed to making false accusations about people.
Enjoy the gym - I'm taking a walk in the National Forest.
This statement raises a question we've asked a time or two in the past: Should a unit of the National Park System be managed for its local community, or the nation? If the culture is to drive ORVs, should that culture be allowed to drive ORVs anywhere in the park system so as to suit that culture?
Ridiculous questions? Perhaps. But isn't that essentially what this debate comes down to at Cape Lookout (and Cape Hatteras)?
(For what it's worth, the ORV situation at Cape Lookout is nothing like the one at Cape Hatteras next door, simply for the fact you can't drive out onto Cape Lookout, you need to take a ferry, which is a limiting factor.)
Of course he will. But all you have to do is follow many of his comments here to learn the truth.
Forest comes later today after the gym. Just easier at the gym because y'don't have to dodge all those mountain bikes.
But as always - you can't provide a single substantiation - just empty accusations.
Kurt - well phrased question. In my view creating culture/business should not be a consideration in establishing a park. However, the potential to destroy existing cultures and business absolutely should be considered.
EC, you raise a good point...but cultures and businesses are a moving target, no? When the seashore was established in 1966, the current version of ORVs did not exist. Visitation did not eclipse 100,000 until 1988.
Nevertheless, visitation has been on a slide since 2011 (going from 601,954 in 2009 to 416,568 last year), which would seem to indicate something other than ORV access is the cause. Putting in what would seem to be a reasonable management plan, one required by an executive order signed by President Nixon 42 years ago, likely would have questionable, if any, impact on that trend.
It would be interesting to see if any studies have been done, either by the NPS or the state of North Carolina, on visitation trends and what might be behind this decline. It is a gorgeous national seashore, one with a very different feel (and appeal) than its neighbor to the north. I'd hate to think someone would decide the answer to the visitation drag is a bridge to the barrier islands.
No one is asking to drive anywhere. There have always been restrictions, resource closures, and designated trails. This misinformation is what our side gets upset about.
The 2011 slide in visitation has happened for the same reason it did at CHNSRA, the increase of resource closures. The use of much greater closure sizes restricted pedestrian and ORV access. This turned away a lot of visitors. That is the only thing that changed.
But at Cape Hatteras, visitation has been increasing since 2011, from 1.96 million in 2011 to 2.3 million in 2012 with a slight dip to 2.2 million last year.
And if you could be more specific re "resource closures," that'd be helpful. A quick search of Cape Lookout's website shows they've been doing closures for years. For instance, in 2008 they were closing areas from April 1 to August 31 due to nesting shorebirds and plovers, and yet visitation went from 486,899 in 2008 to 601,954 in 2009.
I wonder how much of the visitation ups and downs might be related to hurricanes more than resource closures?