ShareTrails | Twelve Days of Legal Updates| Day 6: Potential Recreational Changes for Flaming Gorge

Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area spans the border of Wyoming and Utah. As one of the reservoirs in the Upper Colorado River Basin, the water it holds plays an integral role in not just recreation but water levels in other reservoirs as well. Flaming Gorge provides both OHV recreation and water recreation. Submit your comments to U.S. Forest Service to protect motorized recreation within the planning area.

U.S. Forest Service will create alternatives to address the future of recreation in the Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area. Let USFS know that recreation on both land and water is important and provides many economic benefits to the gateway communities. Planning proposals for Lake Mead and Lake Powell have shown that considerations to remove recreational infrastructure is a possibility. BRC advocates for adaptive management to allow for continued use within the reservoir.

According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, outdoor recreation had a record breaking year in 2021. Outdoor recreation now accounts for $821 billion in economic activity. For reference, the oil and gas industry is $812 billion. Outdoor recreation is popular. It is an economic juggernaut.

Yet, public land agencies act as if this nearly $1 trillion dollar industry is optional or an afterthought. Instead of building new launch ramps, roads, trails, campgrounds, and infrastructure to accommodate the new growth in outdoor recreation, land managers are relentlessly closing public lands and waters for the public to use. It doesn’t make any sense. A deeper dive into the numbers reveals that the engine driving this record-breaking growth is literally the millions of engines that find their way into the various forms of motorized recreation. Non-motorized forms of recreation account for $33 billion in economic value. Gear that is used in all forms of recreation accounts for $52 billion. Motorized forms of recreation account for a shocking $78 billion in economic value.