CIVILITY IS A WONDERFUL THING

If even one driver who hates cyclists reads this column (and next week’s column), I’ll not only consider it well worth the time I spent writing it, but also a big victory for public safety.

The vast majority of motorists courteously and safely share roadways with cyclists, but a very small minority not only aren’t courteous, but for some unexplainable reason fill up with rage whenever they see cyclists on the road ahead. Anybody who regularly rides bicycles on paved roadways knows about this minority. They not only think cyclists have no right to use public roadways but also show their anger by shouting obscenities and giving out the universal salute and even do all sorts of outright dangerous things like coming up behind cyclists blaring their horns, purposely passing inches from handlebars at high speed, or throwing beer cans and other objects, which become lethal missiles for somebody on a bicycle.

Boise Biking Heroine

The Idaho Statesman’s Brian Murphy had it first: Boise’s Oympic Gold Medalist Kristin Armstrong won the gold medal in the cycling world championship time trials Wednesday. In other words, she’s the fastest female cyclist on Planet Earth.

Murphy quotes her as saying, “It’s amazing. It doesn’t matter what year or how many times you become world champion, it always feels the same.”

Next she’ll compete in the international road race, which will be aired on the Universal Sports channel tonight (Wednesday) at 9 p.m. Mountain time.

After the road race, Armstrong plans to retire.  But Boiseans will never let that happen without a welcome-home-again party when she returns from Switzerland, and I’ll go out on a limb here with the prediction that it will be a doozy.

Armstrong’s roster of medals and awards is well-known by Idahoans, but what is less well-known is her persistent and affectionate work in promoting safe cycling and good bike trails and the health benefits for children from riding bikes. In July, she’d been home from Italy just hours when she participated in a public panel on cycling safety in downtown Boise, and her city rides with children and their parents are fresh in our memories after her 2008 Olympic Gold Medal win.

GUEST COMMENTARY

By the time sunrise had lit up the 10,000-foot Lima Peaks on Saturday morning, August 22, over 120 cyclists had already arrived in Lima, Montana, population 250, and set up camp at the Mountain View Motel and RV Park. A steady stream of rigs with bicycles flowed off Interstate 15 and by 9 a.m. sleepy little Lima was hopping.

Bicyclists from around the region drove to the southwest corner of Montana for the 2nd Annual Montana Backcountry Bicycle Festival, an event sponsored by the Montana Mountain Bike Alliance.  Billed as a fun mountain bike gathering that combined world-class backcountry singletrack and down home hospitality, the Festival’s goal was to demonstrate that Montana’s small towns can benefit from mountain bike tourism attracted by great singletrack riding opportunities--the holy grail for backcountry bicyclists. 

Missoula Notebook

Senator Jon Tester’s Forest Jobs and Recreation Act would protect 600,000 acres of Montana wilderness, but it would also mandate the logging of 10,000 acres per year in Montana’s national forests. Several mainstream environmental organizations, such as Trout Unlimited, the Montana Wilderness Association, and the National Wildlife Federation, have joined with recreation interests and local logging companies in support of the bill. Meanwhile, other environmental organizations, such as Alliance for the Wild Rockies and the Wild West Institute, find themselves agreeing with many motorized access advocates that this bill is a bad idea.

I recently sat down with Tom Reed, the Montana/Wyoming backcountry organizer for Trout Unlimited, to get his response to some of the main objections raised by the bill’s critics.

Missoula Notebook

If passed, the Forest Jobs and Recreation Act would designate the first new Wilderness Areas in Montana since 1983, and I’m up here, in a plane provided by the non-profit Ecoflight, to get a first-hand look at what the bill would actually mean to miles of backcountry in some of the most cherished wilderness in the state. Down below me is the battle zone: forests and landscapes treasured by hikers, loggers, snowmobilers, mountain bikers, horse packers, anglers, hunters, and oil and gas firms, among others. The Tester bill aims to protect wild land while satisfying as many of these groups as possible. But can it succeed?

From the Flathead Beacon

A proposed travel and recreation plan for a section of the Kootenai National Forest has some mountain bikers in northwest Montana concerned that they could lose access to trails they have ridden for years. And though any new restrictions on trail access for cyclists are far from finalized, the case demonstrates how mountain biking, a relatively new sport when compared to uses like horseback riding or snowmobiling, can prove difficult for federal land managers to categorize.

The area in question is known as the Galton Project, a section of the Fortine Ranger District stretching from U.S. Highway 93 to the edge of the Kootenai Forest south of Dickey Lake. The Galton Project encompasses the Ten Lakes Wilderness Study Area (WSA), which was established in 1977. After a 2007 lawsuit settlement with the Montana Wilderness Association, the U.S. Forest Service is moving more quickly to establish travel plans for the Ten Lakes WSA.

Guest Column

Three of Montana’s conservation groups recently sponsored a showing of the new Greenfire documentary “Lords of Nature” at the Roxy, followed by a two-hour panel discussion that included Montana’s Wolf Coordinator, Carolyn Sime. The evening served to put in perspective the current controversy over the wolf hunt in Montana and Idaho, which was the subject of a court hearing just a few days earlier. 

As the Montana Director for the Western Watersheds Project, one of the plaintiffs in that suit, it seems to me that this element of perspective is sorely lacking from Montana’s plans to manage wolves, though I certainly appreciated the recent comments from Fish, Wildlife and Parks (FWP) Commissioner Ron Moody in NewWest.  While I am doing my best to keep an open mind on this subject, and appreciate the role sportsmen continue to play in wildlife conservation, I am puzzled by the seeming unwillingness of Montana to look to Minnesota for guidance on this critical issue.

Minnesota is about half the size of Montana, with a population of over 5 million people, and currently has three times as many wolves.  It has almost as many hunters as our entire population (half a million), and derives 3.6 times as much income from livestock as we do. The North Star state also has a lot more experience dealing with wolves than we do, as their wolves were never exterminated.  The contrast in attitudes between Minnesota’s hunters, ranchers, and wolf managers and our own is striking.

Rocky Mountain Front Heritage Act

A new plan that’s been three years in the making would add new protections to 394,000 acres along the Rocky Mountain Front and help protect the embattled wilderness from additional road building and oil and gas development, a grassroots coalition says.

Members of the Coalition to Protect the Rocky Mountain Front unveiled the proposed legislation yesterday and are seeking a congressional sponsor for it. The Rocky Mountain Front Heritage Act, as the coalition has called the proposal, seeks to preserve many existing uses in the region, including grazing, outfitting, and some motorized and non-motorized use of national forest lands—elements that aim to keep recreationalists, ranchers, hunters and anglers happy.

But the group also wants to take new steps to protect the Front’s unique wildlife habitats, landscapes and water. To achieve that, it proposes adding 86,000 acres to the Bob Marshall Wilderness and taking increased measures to fight the spread of noxious weeds.

The Coalition’s main goal is to use a new designation—Conservation Management Area—for 307,000 acres of public lands along the Front. The CMA, the coalition says, would follow regulations set down by the U.S. Forest Service in 2007.

Bitterroot Rebel With a Cause

Hard as it is to be a voice in the wilderness, Judy Hoy has been sounding an alarm in Montana for more than 13 years. Public officials haven’t been listening, she says.

Hoy has been documenting changes—mutations, really—in various ungulate species like deer, publishing her findings in places like the Journal of Environmental Biology. Among her concerns: she’s seen malformed genitalia among male white-tailed deer, which could be the result of pesticide exposures, she theorizes.

THE WISDOM OF THE ORG TABLE

The other day during my early morning shift downtown at the coffee shop at the ORG (Old Retired Guy) table, we turned our attention to how Montana funds its state parks system. Conversation at the ORG table is normally quite intellectual, by the way, and a lot of politicians could benefit from sitting in on our sessions. They’d sure find out what the ORGs really think about things.

We frequently discuss taxes (surprised?), and on that day I happened to mention I was riding my bicycle down to the clerk and recorder office after my morning IQ-boosting session to renew my vehicle registration.

I brought out my renewal card, and we analyzed it to death. I’ve been paying vehicle registration fees for a long time, and now, finally, thanks to the ORG table, I sort of understand what’s going on. And the ORGs say, this might be a good deal, but we don’t like the way the government does it.