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Editor's Letter by Joel Patenaude ATV survey surprises No corner of Wisconsin has taken as strong a stand against obnoxious and damaging ATVs as has northern Vilas County. In 2004, a record turnout for a primary election resulted in the passage, by a nearly 2-1 margin, of a referendum to ban the machines from county land. The county board promptly enacted the people's will. Three years on, the communities of Vilas County have not withered away for lack of ATV riders and their wallets. Judging by the scores of families I saw on a Friday in July bicycling just a short section of the 1-year-old 23-mile paved bike trail from downtown Boulder Junction, to Sayner-Star Lake and on to St. Germain, tourism of the sustainable sort is thriving in this "quiet county." Wanting to attract yet more silent sporters, residents and land owners in Plum Lake (which includes the business districts of Sayner and Star Lake, population 525), petitioned for an extension of the ATV ban to include their township. Just last month, their elected representatives did as they wished. Similar petitions are said to be circulating in several other Vilas County communities. Why have efforts to hold back an ATV invasion emerged anew? Well, because more rural residents are seeing the need to plug the ATV-sized holes in the county ban. That ban, not surprisingly, so angered ATV'ers that they set their sights on the Northern Highland-American Legion (NH-AL) State Forest, much of which lies within Vilas County. A stakeholders group, stacked with ATVing enthusiasts, is now poised to seek Natural Resources Board approval of nearly 60 miles of motorized trail through that unique and ecologically sensitive public property. The NH-AL could well be sacrificed by DNR officials who have fallen for the fallacious argument that ATV riders lack places to ride. Aside from the shrill demands constantly made by the Wisconsin ATV Association and its member clubs, there's no call for the state opening tens of thousand more acres to ATVs. A recent survey found that only 15 to 20 percent of Wisconsinites with registered ATVs – there are about 230,000 in the state – believe that where they ride now is too congested or inadequate. "ATV user satisfaction with current opportunities is quite high, as is private land usage," concludes a master's thesis based on a survey of 519 Wisconsin ATV owners conducted last fall. "(Public land) managers must consider if expanding the supply of trails and opportunities will simply create demand that was previously nonexistent or shift usage from existing sites to new ones." The survey by Robert Smail, a graduate student at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, should force policymakers to question their most basic assumptions about ATVing in this state. Chief among them is the assertion frequently made by the DNR and Department of Tourism that 20 percent of all Wisconsin residents over the age of 16 ride ATVs. Smail rechecked the math and found that ATV riders who use public land account for less than than 6 percent of the population. Consequently, Smail wrote, "the economic impact and political representation of ATV riders may be overstated." Of those that do ride ATVs on public land, less than 38 percent ride trails, 26 percent use the machines for work, 20 percent use them to hunt and 15 percent are thrill riders. The latter group is "likely responsible for a disproportionate amount of ecological damage" and conflict with nonmotorized trail users. But more worrisome is the 65 percent of the all trail-riding ATV'ers who said they prefer to ride off of maintained trails designed specifically for them. "While this does not indicate that (the majority of ATV) users will disobey trail rules, it does suggest that by staying on-trail, users will be suppressing a preference for riding off-trail," Smail warned. And as we know, it only takes one ATV'er to give in to the urge, ride through a wetland and leave tracks for other ATV'ers to follow. Almost 76 percent of the respondents to Smail's survey said they ride their ATVs on their own land. Just 8 percent reported being reliant on public land for their riding. But the best news from the survey was the 92.6 percent who agreed with the statement "riding is a privilige, not a right." A majority also agreed they do not have the right to ride on public land whereever and however they choose. There was even agreement that "some ATVs are too loud and too fast." Now we're getting somewhere. Maybe together we can save the NH-AL from lasting harm.
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