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About Us < Features < GWF Supports Closing Anderson Creek Off-Highway Vehicle Area
By Shirl Parsons, Conservation Issues Coordinator
 Unregulated off-highway vehicle (OHV) use is one of the largest and fastest growing threats to the natural and ecological integrity of our national forests. The number of OHV users has increased tremendously, from 5 million in 1972 to almost 36 million in 2000. Each year hundreds of miles of unauthorized roads and trails are created by thoughtless cross-country use. Unregulated use creates erosion, water degradation and destruction of wildlife habitat.
The Anderson Creek OHV Trail System, located off State Highway 52 in Gilmer County, is one of eleven OHV trail systems in the Chattahoochee and Oconee National Forests which provide a total of 116 miles of trail riding. Anderson Creek, with nine miles of designated trails, is one of three trail systems which allowed for full-size passenger vehicles, as opposed to trails which allow only smaller all-terrain vehicles (ATV) and trail bikes. During the 1980s Anderson Creek was established as an OHV area at a time when OHV recreation was considered a low-use activity. Back then it was mostly used by trail bike riders but as the popularity of OHVs increased the area was also used by four-wheel drive vehicles and ATVs. The area became riddled with over fifteen miles of user-created trails, often located along or through streams, leading away from designated trails into the forest or onto private lands, creating a nuisance for local residents. Significant resource damage occurred, including erosion, compaction, damage to vegetation, riparian areas and aquatic habitat. In 2003 the National Forest Service (NFS) temporarily closed the area to the public in order to develop a new management strategy.
Since 2003 the NFS has spent tens of thousands of dollars to rehabilitate the area. Recently the Chattahoochee National Forest released an Environmental Assessment for the Anderson Creek OHV Trail System and presented three alternatives for management of the area. Georgia Wildlife Federation (GWF) submitted comments in support of the alternative to permanently close the area to OHV use, prevent illegal access by placement of physical barriers, decommission the trail system, ensure rehabilitation and install erosion control measures. This alternative is the proposed action by the NFS. GWF recognizes that there are places in the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest where OHV recreational use can be conducted in a safe way that does not degrade soil, water and other natural resources of the Forest. All OHV use should be limited to such areas.
Anderson Creek is clearly not one of the areas where OHV use should be allowed. Closure of this area will not adversely affect OHV recreational use in the national forest since the Anderson Creek OHV area is only one of eleven such trail systems in the forest. The Whissenhunt OHV Trail System, is just twelve miles due east.
Anderson Creek and its tributary Little Anderson Creek (alternatively known as Duff or Klontz Creek) are some of the finest wild trout streams in Georgia with a reproducing population of Brown and Rainbow trout. There are many reports from GWF members of trophy Brown trout being caught in Anderson Creek. Unfortunately the Anderson Creek OHV area, sited on the headwaters of these streams, has had a very negative impact on the water quality of these streams. The original trail configuration actually had a section of OHV trail that was literally in Little Anderson Creek. Over the years the area became crisscrossed with illegal user-created trails that caused both these fine streams to run red with silt upon the slightest rain event. For a number of years ATV riders were traveling up and down Little Anderson Creek and through a culvert underneath Forest Service road 357, causing near total destruction of the riparian area.
Nothing in this decision will in any way limit other recreational use of this area such as hunting or fishing. At the height of the OHV use of the area the noise level was such that most hunters abandoned the area. This area contains prime Black Bear habitat and archery hunters have enjoyed notable success in the area in the last few years. Reports that GWF has received from local members indicate that the hunting and fishing has improved in the area since the OHV closure in 2003.
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