History of the Grand Canyon

dedmiston wrote:

agesilaus wrote:

dedmiston wrote:

agesilaus wrote:
As a group, OHV enthusiasts do not tolerate any amount of vandalism.
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I am sure that is true but you have to admit there is no other explanation for what happened in Joshua Tree. OHV outlaws cut down trees to gain access to land they normally would not be able to drive on.

How do you know it wasn't some dork in a Prius? Nobody knows who did it.

Were there tire tracks heading over the spot where the trees were? Were they from a four wheeler or trail bike? Anyway look up Occam's Razor.

Well, since you're the one making the accusations, I figured you had already looked up the tracks or had some other sort of evidence.

I live in Southern California and have a lot of experience with the OHV community. I haven't heard any credible reports that the damage at Joshua Tree was caused by off-roaders. It could easily have been some human driving their car off the road, but that's a completely different animal. The reports I've heard/read talked about "tourists".

Think about what it takes to get to an area like this. You load your dirt bikes or 4x4 into your toy hauler or cargo trailer and then you drive someplace where you can stage and unload. Staging your gear takes a lot of room and only certain areas lend themselves to staging. You certainly couldn't stage and unload in a National Park, especially not with the uncontrolled crowds that were at Joshua Tree during the shutdown. You couldn't even park a rig that size, let alone drop the ramp and roll out your vehicles.

And then once you've staged and put on all your gear to go ride, you need trails to get around. You can't just ride down the highway like Mel Gibson in Road Warrior. The cops would be all over you. And riding through a National Park would actually be really hard because of all the fences and barriers.

I'm not saying it couldn't have happened, but based on my own experience I think it would be pretty unlikely. And if it did happen the way you say, there would have been outrage on all of the usual riding forums.

So lacking anything other than the posts of a gentleman from Florida, I'm going to still disagree with you.

Anyway, we've wandered far afoot of the Grand Canyon topic.