Plan to Scrap Roadless Rule Protections Nears Comment Deadline

The Trump Administration’s plan to roll back Roadless Area protections on vast swaths of U.S. Forest Service land has been a heated source of controversy for well over a year now. On October 18, 2026, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees the Forest Service, released its long-awaited Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on the subject. The EIS outlined the agency’s “preferred alternative” to completely repeal the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule, which would allow new road building on approximately 45 million acres of public land across the county.

The EIS kicked off a short 30-day comment period. Now, under mounting pressure—including a letter from 164 lawmakers asking for a full 120 day extension to the comment period—the USDA has added 15 days to the overall window.

The Three Alternatives

So far, more than 230,000 people have commented on the Administration’s plan to repeal the Roadless Rule. In addition to its preferred plan to completely scrap the rule (Alternative 2), USFS has provided two additional alternatives that public land users can choose when commenting.

Alternative 1 would keep the existing rule in place. Alternative 3 would remove protections for more than 31 million acres nationwide. That’s roughly 70 percent of existing inventoried Roadless Areas, excluding Colorado and Idaho, which already have their own state-level Roadless Area protections. Notably, the third alternative would strip protections from a full 3 million acres inside the Tongass National Forest of southeast Alaska. This area serves as key spawning and rearing habitat for sea-run trout and salmon.

Trout Unlimited is one of the primary opponents of the Administration’s plan to scrap the Roadless Rule. In a recent press release, the organization said that Roadless areas serve as the last best strongholds for native fish and wildlife, providing high quality, intact habitat for trout, salmon, deer, and elk, among other species.

“There’s absolutely no need to reverse the Roadless Rule – a policy that for 25 years has made hunting and fishing better, protected drinking water and threatened and endangered species,” said Chris Wood, president and CEO of Trout Unlimited. Wood helped craft the rule when he worked for USFS under Chief Mike Dombeck back in the early 2000s.

The Wildfire Argument

The Administration’s primary argument for repealing the Roadless Rule hinges on the idea that new road construction in these protected backcountry areas will lead to increased fire suppression in the West. Opponents say that ignores the fact that most fires are human caused. And that the vast majority of suppression takes place in the already heavily roaded Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI).

They also point out that the 2001 Roadless Rule has carve outs and exceptions that allow USFS to construct new roads in Inventoried Roadless Areas, whenever they’re needed for firefighting. And that a huge portion of Roadless acres are in wetter parts of the East, or in southeast Alaska, where public land wildfire isn’t an ongoing concern.

“Arguments that the 2001 Roadless Rule prevents forest health treatments in roadless areas are belied by the Forest Service’s own data,” Wood said. “Its research demonstrates that treatments to reduce the risk of unnaturally intense fires actually occur more often in roadless areas than they do on other forested areas of the national forest system.” 

Backcountry Hunters & Anglers (BHA) also supports Alternative 1, which keeps current Roadless Rule protections in tact. They says that the USDA’s claims that a wholesale recession of the rule is necessary to address wildfire risk aren’t true. “The Roadless Rule also makes fiscal sense,” BHA added, in a recent statement. “The Forest Service already manages roughly 370,000 miles of roads and faces approximately $10.8 billion in deferred maintenance, with more than half attributable to roads alone. Adding new roads and long-term maintenance obligations won’t solve that problem.”

It’s important to note that the push to repeal the Roadless Rule is happening in conjunction with a plan to re-write longstanding Travel Management Rules on USFS lands and an Executive Order that calls for expanded off-road vehicle use on all federally managed public lands.

More Roads, More Vehicles, Less Elk?

In a recent interview with Field & Stream, BHA President and CEO Ryan Callaghan said that “if [the Travel Management] revisions go through the way they’re listed in the Federal Register, and you take that in conjunction with the wholesale recision of the Roadless Rule, and the OHV Executive Order, it’s not hyperbolic to say that we’re going to be heading into elk-less elk woods on our National Forests by the time hunting open up next season,” he says. “We’re going to have public land hunters staring at public wildlife on private ground with no way to get to them.”

In its first public statement since USDA head Brooke Rollins announce her intentions to do away the Roadless Rule in June 2025, the Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation (RMEF)—the largest elk-focused conservation group in the country—said the Roadless Rule debate has been “hyperbolic and polarizing.” RMEF says it supports alternative 3.

“The Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation has resisted initial pressure to take an immediate or reactive position on the proposal,” the organization said in a September 9 press release, which can be read in full here. “Entering the public comment process, we were particularly interested in nearly one quarter of Inventoried Roadless Areas that today lie in the Wildland-Urban Interface (WUI). Upon reviewing the details of the proposed rule, alternative 3 appears to address these specific areas. Alternative 3 presents several items we support.”

Though that alternative would still remove road-building restrictions on some 31.7 million acres of inventoried Roadless Areas, RMEF said it provides “opportunities for active forest management and improved big game habitat.” And that it would allow strategically placed roads that can improve suppression effectiveness near communities and critical infrastructure.

Read Next: Trump Orders More Off-Road Vehicle Use on America’s Public Lands

With the 15-day extension now in place, public land users have until October 6 to comment on the USDA’s preferred alternative to rescind the Roadless Rule in full. If you’d like to comment, you can do so here. Field & Stream will continue to cover the Roadless Rule debate as more details emerge.

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