Park Service rejects claims of cleaner, quieter snowmobiles

Associated Press

WASHINGTON — A National Park Service study rejects claims that snowmobile makers are producing cleaner vehicles that do not disturb wildlife or pollute the air.

At issue is whether the Bush administration will uphold, weaken or scrap a Clinton-era ban on snowmobiling in Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks.

The Park Service study discredited almost all of the data from snowmobile makers, as well as industry-friendly information provided by the states of Wyoming and Montana.

The study is to be released next week. A draft review of the report was released Wednesday.

The study was ordered by the administration as part of a settlement of a lawsuit by snowmobile makers seeking to roll back the snowmobile ban in the two parks and on the John D. Rockefeller Jr. Memorial Parkway, an 82-mile road linking them.

Ed Klim, president of the International Snowmobile Manufacturers Association, said he was stunned by the report’s findings. He insisted that the Park Service must not have read the information his trade group provided.

"They aren’t considering the new data," he said. "That’s all it can mean to me."

Conservation groups, many of which support the ban on snowmobiles, called the report a waste of taxpayer money because it found what was already known.

"The Park Service study that will be released next week clearly proves that the original decision to phase out snowmobiles was the best one for Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks," said Chris Mehl, a spokesman for The Wilderness Society.

In its suit, the International Snowmobile Manufacturers Association, an industry group based in Michigan, argued that an earlier Park Service study — which was the basis for the ban — relied on old emissions and noise data, and failed to consider a new generation of cleaner, quieter machines.

A final decision on whether to uphold the ban on snowmobile use, or otherwise change the order, will come in November, Park Service spokeswoman Marsha Karle said.