This area of the Valley of 10,000 Smokes in Katmai National Park is proposed for closure to bicycles/NPS.
As mountain bikes continue to evolve, they are able to tackle more and more terrain...and are found in more and more places. But at Katmai National Park and Preserve in Alaska, officials don't believe bikes of any kind fit in the Valley of 10,000 Smokes and are moving to ban them via an update to the superintendent's compendium, or rulebook.
The reasons for this restriction are as follows:
1) The iconic Valley of 10,000 Smokes is a unique resource and the protection of this geological resource was the reason Katmai National Monument was created.
2) The formation of cryptobiotic soils is a naturally occurring phenomenon that is part of the biological succession of a disturbed landscape;
3) Cryptobiotic crusts are known to be very sensitive to disturbance.
4) Compressional and shearing disturbances as those caused by the action of bicycle wheels can affect the ability of the cryptobiotic crusts to:
* Maintain diversity of its crust community: reducing the crust community to a few species of cyanobacteria instead of the successional community of multiple species of cyanobacteria, lichens and mosses:
* Maintain cyanobacterial connection to soil particles, which in turn, increases the erosion of the underlying soils, thus decreasing soil fertility;
* Maintain surface roughness, which affects local hydrologic regimes and vascular plant seed entrapment, which then influences the successional pattern of the area;
* Maintain soil temperatures that allow for the natural succession of the cryptobiotic soils from cyanobacteria to annual mosses.
5) Bicycle use has the potential to significantly increase the levels of disturbance to these crusts compared to the hiking activity.
6) Visitors hiking the Valley of 10,000 Smokes follow a route that is not designed for bicycle use and in a few locations where there are steep drop-offs there may not be places that bicycle users could pass hikers safely.
7) The study of undisturbed cryptobiotic soils in Katmai National Park is of scientific value.
The reasons less restrictive measures will not be effective:
1) The use of wheeled conveyances on cryptobiotic soils is detrimental to the soils due to the shearing forces created by the weight of the wheels on the substrate.
2) Routes developed are narrow and bicycles going off-route to pass other users would damage the cryptobiotic soils on either side of the trail.
A public meeting and information session on this and other proposed changes is set for Monday, February 9, from 7 p.m.-9 p.m. at the Naknek Native Village Council Building (Dolly's Hall) in Naknek. For those unable to attend the meeting, written comments can be submitted online through February 15.
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Comments
So, are they banning hikers as well? Since studies have shown that hikers and cyclists have roughly the same impact on the soil? Or is it an anti bike bias wrapped in pseudo science?
One part of that I didn't get--wouldn't hikers, just like bikers, have to step off trail to allow other hikers to pass?
That is BS: bikes erode the landscape much more quickly and dramatically than foot traffic. I've seen this on trails previously closed to biking that were then opened up to mountain biking. Within a couple of years these trails, once narrow and covered with plants at the edges, had become converted to wide, bare troughs. Ugly!
Back in the mid 80s Katmai was faced with this same. A group of mountain bikers asked for permission to ride the road to the Valley of 10K Smokes and then descend onto the ash field. I said no. Anyone riding a bike on the road could set off a chase by a bear. The crust on the ash fields in the Valley of !0K Smokes are vulnerable to shredding by bike tires. The decision was not challenged.