Tongass National Forest
Roads Through the Tongass Provide Access, But at What Cost?
Page 1: Forest Conditions in Southest Alaska
Page 2: Timber Sales on Tongass National Forest
Page 3: Roads through the Tongass provide access, but at what cost?
» Download the map as a PDF file. (490kb)
The Tongass already contains:
» 4,300 miles of roads6
» that provide access to 1.4 million acres of public lands7
» including 475,000 acres of productive old forest.8
» This forestland contains 5.4 billion board-feet of harvestable old-growth9
» and 7.7 billion additional board-feet of second-growth estimated to reach harvestable levels within the next 100 years.10
This 13 billion board-feet located within already-roaded areas will support timber harvest at recent average levels and represents the resource base for a sustainable logging industry.11
No more roads need be built.
The Tongass already contains:
» 4,300 miles of roads6
» which have a maintenance backlog of over $800 million12
» and intersect thousands of documented salmon-bearing streams13
» Among these road-stream crossings, 66% of the culverts are inadequate for salmon passage14
Building new roads diminishes valuable habitat, increasing the maintenance responsibilities of an already overburdened U.S. Forest Service and threatening the long-term viability of many salmon runs.
No more roads should be built.
» thereby violating the Tongass Land and Resource Management Plan directive to "maintain fish passage through stream crossing structures."15
