Interim Guidance for Off-Highway Vehicle Management – Travel and Transportation Management Planning

The purpose of this Instruction Memorandum (IM) is to provide direction concerning how Bureau of Land Management (BLM) offices and personnel should conduct ongoing Travel and Transportation Management (TTM) planning efforts in light of Executive Order (EO) 14408 and the BLM rulemaking directed by that EO.¹ This IM provides interim guidance and is intended to aid BLM State Directors and Field Officials to efficiently and effectively prioritize ongoing TTM planning efforts, while the BLM completes the rulemaking directed by EO 14408.

Interim Guidance

During the pendency of the rulemaking effort directed by EO 14408, State Directors and Field Officials should:

1. Continue to comply with all provisions of the BLM’s off-highway vehicle (OHV) regulations at 43 CFR Part 8340. While EO 14408 rescinded EOs 11644 and 11989 and directed the BLM to revise the Part 8340 regulations accordingly, EO 14408 did not repeal or revise the BLM’s regulations, which remain in effect. Similarly, the BLM’s existing manuals and handbooks that discuss implementation of the Part 8340 regulations remain in effect and should continue to be followed. However, where in conflict, this Interim Guidance supersedes existing direction in BLM Manual 1626, Travel and Transportation Management and BLM Handbook H-8342, Travel and Transportation.
    
2. Continue to administer and enforce the BLM’s current area, road, and trail designations, which remain in effect unless and until they are revised in accordance with the Part 8340 regulations and other applicable laws.
    
3. Continue working on TTM planning efforts. State Directors and Field Officials should not pause or delay priority TTM planning efforts. For instance, State Directors and Field Officials should continue to perform route inventories, provide public participation opportunities, and analyze the impacts of TTM alternatives in accordance with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and other applicable laws. However, State Directors and Field Offices must coordinate with the BLM Director’s Office prior to signing any TTM decisions, including, but not limited to, travel management plans and individual route designation decisions.
    

4. Focus the NEPA analysis supporting ongoing TTM planning efforts on the impacts of TTM alternatives. Unless required by a court order or settlement agreement, application of the designation criteria at 43 CFR 8342.1, commonly known as the “minimization criteria,” should be addressed in a decision document, not the NEPA analysis supporting that decision document.

    

   [1] This Instruction Memorandum is not intended to, and does not, create any right or benefit, substantive or procedural, enforceable at law or equity by a party against the United States, its departments, agencies, instrumentalities or entities, its officers or employees, or any other person.