Amery-Dresser Wisconsin Trail Protected from ATVs

Motorized use not allowed on Amery-Dresser TrailGregg Westigard 16.JAN.08BALSAM LAKE – The Amery to Dresser Trail has been ruled closed to all motorized use. Polk County Circuit Court Judge Molly GaleWyrick issued a decision Jan. 7 granting the request of the petitioners in the case, Friends of L.O.G. Greenway and Richard Roos, a landowner. The case, which was filed last April, protested the Department of Natural Resources Environmental Assessment which would have allowed snowmobiles and ATVs to use the former railroad bed. The issue now goes back to the DNR.

GaleWyrick cites the Wisconsin statute establishing the system of state trails which she says “plainly limits” the trails to nonmotorized use. She notes that the permitted uses in the statute includes “riders of electric personal assisted mobility devices” and says that if snowmobile and ATV use had been intended, the statute would have said motorized devices rather than list one specific device.