Cape Hatteras National Seashore Off Road Vehicle Management Plan

Excerpt from Cape Hatteras National Seashore Off-Road Vehicle Management Plan: Draft Environmental Impact Statement; March 2010 Cape Hatteras National Seashore provides a variety of visitor experiences. It is a long, essentially linear park, visitation is high, and parking spaces near roads are limited. Some popular beach sites, particularly those near the inlets and Cape Point, are a distance from established or possible parking spaces. Visitors who come for some popular recreational activities such as surf fishing and picnicking are accustomed to using large amounts and types of recreational equipment that cannot practically be hauled over these distances by most visitors without some form of motorized access. For many visitors, the time needed and the physical challenge of hiking to the distant sites, or for some even to close sites, can discourage or preclude access by non-motorized means. As a result, orvs have long served as a primary form of access for many portions of the beach in the Seashore, and continue to be the most practical available means of access and parking for many visitors. In addition to these recreation opportunities, the Seashore is home to important habitats created by the Seashore's dynamic environmental processes, including habitats for several federally listed species including the piping plover and three species of sea turtles. These habitats are also home to numerous other protected species, as well as other wildlife. The nps is required to conserve and protect all of these species, as well as the other resources and values of the Seashore. The use of orvs must therefore be regulated in a manner that is consistent with applicable law, and appropriately addresses resource protection (including protected, threatened, and endangered species), potential conflicts among the various Seashore users, and visitor safety. Section 4.l0(b) of the regulations in Title 36 of the Code of Federal Regulations, which implements Executive Orders 11644 and 11989, prohibits off-road use of motor vehicles except on designated routes or areas. It requires that routes and areas designated for orv use shall be promulgated as special regulations in compliance with other applicable laws. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.