Conflict over off-road expansion plan
Park southwest of Tracy has been hot topic for years
TRACY — A plan to triple the size of an off-highway vehicle park southwest of here lurched forward this week with the release of a formal proposal.
But the road ahead will be bumpy, if comments submitted by the public are any indication.
The Carnegie State Vehicular Recreation Area in San Joaquin and Alameda counties has long been a sensitive subject. Off-roaders cherish it, because there are only so many places they can ride in California.
“I was born to ride,” 9-year-old Emily Sandahl wrote to state officials, sharing her support of the expansion. “I practically grew up at Carnegie. I’ve had lots of memories here.”
Neighboring landowners, environmentalists, scientists and historians are less fond of the place. Eleven scholars and professors from the University of California, Berkeley, voiced their opposition to the expansion in a letter earlier this week, saying they were “dismayed that the state would further trample” an area with an unusually diverse array of plants and animals.
Even some descendants of men who worked as coal miners or brick-makers in historic towns along Corral Hollow Creek more than a century ago say they don’t want the pastoral scene “ruined” by motorcycles.
Documents released Thursday by the state Department of Parks and Recreation describe the state’s proposal as the “best balance” between competing interests.
Originally a private motorcycle park, Carnegie’s 1,575 acres opened to the public in 1980. In the late 1990s, state officials acquired another 3,100 acres immediately to the west of the existing park. But that land never has been opened to riders, much to their chagrin.
That would change under the new plan.
The expansion area offers gentler terrain than the existing park, meaning more opportunities for less experienced riders, the state says.
The expansion also would feed a growing demand for off-highway riding, which dropped off during the recession but again is gaining in popularity. Over the past decade, Carnegie has averaged about 104,000 visits per year.
Environmental documents released this week acknowledge the expansion could cause erosion, could disturb sensitive species such as the California red-legged frog, and could kick up dust, among other issues. In most cases, the state says those impacts are not significant.
Building the paths or interpretive centers outlined in the plan will require another, more specific level of environmental study, said Randy Caldera, the superintendent at Carnegie.
“There's a misconception that this is just going to give the state this open book to do whatever they want,” Caldera said. That’s not the case, he added.
Mark Connolly, a Tracy attorney who owns a ranch adjacent to the existing park, said the state's conclusion that most environmental impacts aren’t significant is “ridiculous.” “They know through their own studies the impact on water, on threatened and endangered species, dust and noise and erosion,” Connolly said. “Those impacts are absolutely known.”
State officials rejected an environmentally friendlier alternative that would have more strictly limited off-road access in the expansion area. The state concluded that alternative did not consider increased demand for off-road access in the future.
Hundreds of public comments on earlier outlines of the expansion plan have also been made available. David Haley of Eureka wrote that he once broke his collarbone at Carnegie but still loves the place.
“I feel a balance is needed, and motorcycle riding in the dirt is good and healthy if properly managed,” he said.
The 1908 directory for San Joaquin County contains listings for the town of Tesla, wrote Marguerite Maria Rivas of Staten Island, N.Y. Named in that directory are brick-makers, artisans and sculptors — including her great grandfather, Emanuel Rivas.
These men took advantage of rich clay soils to provide a growing state with bricks. Evidence of their labors is seen today in historic structures all over California.
“I am proud to say I am a descendant of Carnegie-Tesla,” Marguerite Rivas wrote. “There are others like me who do not know of their rich family and cultural history, and it would be a shame if that opportunity were lost to them in the racket of off-highway vehicles.”
http://www.recordnet.com/article/20150424/NEWS/150429747/-1/A_BIZ
