XI. SNOWMOBILES& ATV USE in the Adirondacks

Resources related to OHVs in the Adirondacks, withbullet point notes (by Rachel Neugarten.)

Back to Annotated Bibliography.

Karasin, Leslie. 2003. All-Terrain Vehicles in the Adirondacks: Issues and Options. Wildlife Conservation Society Working Paper No. 21. April, 2003. 75 pp. http://www.wcs.org/media/file/ATVs_in_ADKs.pdf

• summarizes national statistics and studies of ATV use and impacts on natural areas
• Effects on environment: damage to soils, damage to vegetation, introduction of exotic species, damage to wetlands and water quality, air pollution, impacts on wildlife,
• Impacts on non-motorized users: ATVs seen as incompatible with other types of recreational use, “off-road vehicles as the most irritating noise sources”, hunters feel that motorized recreational vehicles detract from their recreational experience
• Safety: 1.5 deaths per 10,000 ATVs (slightly less than cars), 262 injuries per 10,000 ATVs (twice as many as cars), 35% of ATV-caused deaths and 40% of injuries are children under age of 16.
• Economics: benefits: difficult to capture - ATV sales over $3 billion annually, in MI estimate motorized recreational vehicles (ATVs, SUVs, motorcycles) generate 16.4 million in income and supported 822 jobs; in PE estimate total annual economic impact of OHVs is 1.14 billion (both public and private land)
• Economics: costs: difficult to capture – 15,000-30,000 per mile construction of good trails, $1000 per mile in annual maintenance. Rehabilitation costs estimated as $800-1400 per mile of illegal road

• Summarizes current use of snowmobile trails, history of snowmobiles in the park
• Estimates approximately 840 miles of snowmobile trails on forest preserve (based on 1980 survey), and there is estimated to be over 1,100 miles of funded snowmobile trails on private lands in the park
• Municipalities lease snowmobile trails from large landowners for approximately $1000 per year per mile of trail
• outlines "community connection goals" i.e. Indian Lake to Long Lake, Minerva to Newcomb, North Hudson to Newcomb, etc.
• propose reconfiguring snowmobile trails to protect interior wild forest areas and shift snowmobile use closer to the periphery of the Forest Preserve along transportation corridors
• law enforcement is an issue, parks pays 50% of local law enforcement costs up to 12,500. During 2000, $30,000 was provided to municipalities for snowmobile enforcement within the Park. propose increasing enforcement, education, signage, monitoring
• Approximately 148,000 snowmobiles were registered in 2005 - 2006, About 15% of New York snowmobile registrations are by non-residents
• average snowmobilers were traveling nearly 1000 miles per season, spending 24 days snowmobiling and overnighting 3.5 days in the State each year, but about one-third of the average resident rider’s annual mileage was outside New York State (Merwin study)
• snowmobiling contributes $52.2 million annually to the Adirondack Park’s regional economy, including consideration for secondary spending (NYS OPRHP 2004)

• current estimates of snowmobile contributions to Adirondack Park economy reach over $46 million per year
• Negative effects include air, noise and water pollution, wildlife disturbance, soil and vegetation damage, as well as causing conflicts with other recreationalists.
• draft DEC plan is inadequate to address all of the impacts currently inflicted by snowmobiles
• Recommend snowmobilers contribute to conservation in the park through an increase of registration fees
• Recommend air and noise pollution be curtailed through an increase emission standards.
• Due to the lack of information on the impacts of snowmobiling in the Park further studies should be conducted