On Thursday, Assistant Interior Secretary Lyle Laverty ordered the National Park Service to ease existing mountain biking restrictions, possibly opening nearly eight million acres of recommended or proposed wilderness lands in approximately 30 parks to mountain biking.

The Bush administration has released several controversial rule changes and “clarifications” over the last few months that have put even the most critical of Bush’s environmental record into a state of disbelief at the potential environmental consequences of those regulations. But this one is a little different.

The rule change issued Thursday pits the sometimes-allied (non-motorized) recreational environmentalists against the “preservationists,” who see the rule change as just another human incursion into pristine areas that would further degrade its ecological integrity. Opponents argue that mountain biking can lead to erosion thus threatening stream health and that mountain bikers are often at the root of on-trail conflicts with hikers and horseback riders.

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Perhaps smarting over a judge’s recent decision to scratch the Bush administration’s plan to allow snowmobiles in Yellowstone National Park, now Bush has said, “Damn it! If I can’t snowmobile in Yellowstone, at least I want to go mountain biking!”

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