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Help Protect the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness from Motorboats

The U.S. Forest Service (FS) is conducting a needs assessment of commercial recreational services within the Boundary Water Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW) as part of a lawsuit settlement with Wilderness Watch over motorized towboat use in the 1.1 million-acre Wilderness.

The Boundary Waters is America's most popular and water-rich Wilderness. Its more than 1,000 pristine lakes and 1,200 miles of rivers and streams are among the cleanest waters in North America.

In 2015, Wilderness Watch filed a lawsuit in federal district court to force the FS to comply with its own plans and regulations limiting commercial towboat use in the Boundary Waters. The FS had allowed towboat use to grow so much that such use may be pushing all motorboat use in the BWCAW to exceed the overall motorboat cap imposed by Congress as well as subsequent reductions made to preserve wilderness values.

Wilderness Watch discovered that the FS never set up any system to actually monitor or control the number of towboat trips. The FS instead relied upon reports submitted by the outfitters after the season was finished. These after-the-fact reports provided no way for the FS to track the number of towboat trips during the season, and to end towboat trips when the maximum limit had been reached. As a result, many years since 1993 witnessed significant violations of the towboat limit, with the FS doing nothing to correct this problem, until Wilderness Watch’s successful lawsuit forced them to finally confront this issue.

Towboats are profitable commercial operations that ferry canoe parties as far into the BWCAW as motorboat use is allowed in order to save canoeists time. Despite their name, towboats typically do not tow canoes, but rather carry them on overhead racks. But towboat use makes many lakes (or chains of lakes) wilderness sacrifice zones with motorboats constantly buzzing back and forth.

Making matters worse, towboat customers are often wilderness paddlers who want to save time getting to the adjacent Quetico Provincial Park on the Ontario side of the border, which generally has a wilder feel than the BWCAW. But in using towboat services, these customers degrade the Boundary Waters Wilderness through which they zoom.

PLEASE NOTE: In addition to submitting your public comment below, we highly encourage you to complete the Needs Assessment Public Comment Worksheet created by the Forest Service for obtaining public input on this issue. Submitting the worksheet requires you to print it out and send it either via email to lee.stewart@usda.gov or via postal mail to Superior National Forest, c/o Lee Stewart, 8901 Grand Avenue Place, Duluth, MN 55808. In any event, if you have visited the Boundary Waters and had your wilderness experience impacted by commercial towboats, we strongly encourage you to describe those impacts when submitting your comment below or when filling out the Forest Service form.

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Help Protect the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness from Motorboats

Superior National Forest

Subject: RE: Recreational Commercial Services Needs Assessment for BWCAW

Message:

Dear Lee Stewart: Please accept my public comments regarding the U.S. Forest Service’s Recreational Commercial Services Needs Assessment for the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness (BWCAW). Commercial towboat services are not necessary in the BWCAW. It is easy enough to reach various destinations in the BWCAW without a motorized tow, and in any event, ease is not what a wilderness experience is about. That the Boundary Waters is already one of the most heavily used Wildernesses – including by groups of young girl and boy scouts and people with disabilities – without the use of towboats or other motorboats shows that it is simply not necessary to provide commercial towboat services in order for people to fully realize the recreational benefits of the Boundary Waters Wilderness. Towboat operators don't really act as guides, but just taxi service for convenience. Motorized tows are not needed to carry equipment and supplies because people can haul those in their non-motorized boats the “Wilderness Way.” Commercial, motorized towboat services degrade wilderness conditions and other people’s experience of the Wilderness. The motorized towboats are noisy, cause crowding, impact visitors’ wilderness experience and also disturb wildlife. Motorized towboats create motorized bottlenecks at entry points into the BWCAW, especially in places like the Moose Chain, and they give an unfair advantage for campsites in the BWCAW to those who are able to afford a commercial, motorized towboat service. The notion that motorized towboats are needed for dispersal to prevent overcrowding is also misguided because the amount of back-and-forth buzzing by motorized towboats in high-use areas actually undermines this goal. Visitors to the BWCAW should accept Wilderness on its own terms and choose their destination based on ability and willingness to work for it, not simply pay to be whisked by motorized towboats to the far reaches of the BWCAW. Commercial, motorized towboat use is not a necessary commercial service, and towboats significantly degrade solitude and other wilderness values. Towboat use should be eliminated, or significantly reduced, to preserve wilderness character in the BWCAW. Thank you for your time and consideration.

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Help Protect the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness from Motorboats

Help Protect the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness from Motorboats

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