Wild Lands at the Edge of the Boundary Waters At Risk
On June 23, 2025, the USDA announced plans to dismantle the 2001 Roadless Rule, stripping protections from 58.5 million acres of National Forest roadless areas and opening them to road building and logging. For nearly a quarter of a century, the Roadless Rule has protected these ecologically diverse areas from development and extraction, and over 75% of American support the Roadless Rule, but the current administration wants to rescind it to open up these areas to the lumber barons.
Because I live on Superior National Forest in northern Minnesota and use the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness and surrounding lakes often, I wanted to see what potential impact this could have on the areas I utilize. I was surprised to find that Crescent Lake of the Crescent Lake Canoe Route that I recently wrote about would be directly impacted. Additionally, pristine shoreline views from The Grade (this is the roads name) would be impacted on Lichen and Jock Mock Lakes. The roadless areas surround those lakes, except on the north side which has a road on it.
Additionally, there are large sections of Roadless Rule areas south of the Boundary Waters on the Grand Marais and Tofte side. Some of these areas do have roads and trails into them that allow us to access them for recreation, such as canoeing, kayaking, power boating, fishing, etc…. It’s not like we can’t park at boat ramps and enjoy these areas, or for the remote lakes hike in on portage trails. They are open for humans to visit, they’re just off limits for new roads. And knowing what logging cuts look like with all the new roads they put in, it isn’t great. We already do that all over the rest of the forest. So, we should leave these areas free of roads.
I decided to map the impact on the Superior National Forest. On this map, the orange areas show the 62,004 acres of lands at risk on the Superior National Forest in northern Minnesota, home to the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness.
What can you do?
The first thing to do is get informed about the areas protected by the Roadless Rule. The Outdoor Alliance, which is a nonprofit devoted to outdoor recreation and our outdoor spaces, has a great primer on this issue. You can also take action on their website. The Environment America Research & Policy Center, which is an organization devoted to protecting the outdoors, also has a statement on it.
After you are informed on the topic, talk to your friends and family about it and let them know what is going on right here in Minnesota and nationally.
It seems crazy to me that the government would rescind this rule so the lumber barons can get at the old growth in there when 75% of Americans support this rule. It’s almost as if they don’t care about the opinions of Americans if it can make their rich buddies even richer. They should listen to the 75% of Americans that say keep these areas roadless.
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