President Clinton Allows Mountain Biking On New National Monument Trails

IMBA Trail News
Volume 13, Number 3
Summer 2000

In his April designation of the Giant Sequoia National Monument (California), President Clinton fulfilled his promise to IMBA President Ashley Korenblat (ITN Early Summer 2000). The President's Proclamation clearly distinguished bicycling from motorized recreation by limiting bicycles to designated roads and trails, while requiring motor vehicles to use only designated roads.

When Korenblat met with Mr. Clinton at the White House in March, she told him that IMBA supports the President's creation of new national monuments, but is concerned about the travel management language. An earlier proclamation of the Grand Canyon-Parashant National Monument prohibited mechanized (bicycle) travel "off road." During Korenblat's D.C. visit, Department of Interior lawyers assured her that the rule was not meant to ban bicycling on trails, but rather to prohibit cross-country travel. IMBA agrees that bikes should not travel cross-country - off of trails - but we wanted clarification.

President Clinton's Giant Sequoia Proclamation makes it clear that bikes are allowed on trails in that area. Unfortunately, subsequent proclamations of national monuments in Oregon, Washington, and Arizona have reverted to the confusing "off-road" language used in the Parashant plan. IMBA will continue to push the Interior Department to provide a written clarification of the "off-road" prohibition as it applied to travel management in all newly designated National Monuments.