Al.com ATV riders are chewing up terrain and tax dollars, according to state and local officials, who are cracking down on riders.
All-terrain vehicles roaring down roadsides are causing erosion and landslides and wreaking havoc on construction projects, according to the Alabama Department of Transportation.
About a month ago, the department extended an offer to the Mobile County Sheriff’s Office: Patrol state and federal roadways for illegal ATV driving, and ALDOT will pay the deputies’ hourly wages while they search, according to Sheriff’s Office officials
Since then, deputies have issued 43 trespassing citations to ATV drivers, according to ALDOT records as of late last week.
The citations have been for riding along Interstate 10 and the unopened portion of the new U.S. 98, according to the records.
Recently, deputies arrested three ATV drivers for trespassing. One was taken into custody for a previous warrant, and another on a drug possession charge, according to ALDOT.
“We get eight to 10 calls a day from people complaining about ATV riders,” said Sheriff’s Office Sgt. Wayne Goolsby, who oversees the ATV patrols. “And we probably make two to three arrests each weekend.”
Goolsby’s rule: “If it’s not your property or you don’t have a prior agreement, you’re not supposed to be on it.”
First-time offenders are issued a warning, and Goolsby said their names are put on a computerized list to ferret out repeat offenders. More than 400 names are on the list.
Second-time offenders are ticketed and can be arrested, Goolsby said.
ALDOT spokeswoman Rebecca Leigh White said the department is pushing enforcement in Mobile County alone because “that’s where we are predominantly seeing damage, and in our initial effort, we are concentrating on where the damage has been most severe.
Tony Harris, special assistant to ALDOT’s director, said that ATV’s have caused more than $300,000 in damage statewide so far this year.
“Damage caused by ATVs along state roadways and rights-of-way has a bottom-line impact on the taxpayers,” Harris said in a release.
In 2008, the state spent more than $100,000 to repair slope damage caused by ATVs, so there is an obvious worsening trend. That’s why we’re working with local law enforcement to prevent illegal riding and to be good fiscal and environmental stewards.”
Goolsby said, “Ninety-nine percent of people who ride ATVs are good people. But it’s that one percent that does the destruction. ALDOT may make an embankment, let’s say, and it takes months to build. ATV drivers will destroy it in three hours.”
In addition to patrolling I-10, Ala. 158 and the new U.S. 98 bypass for ALDOT, deputies also have focused enforcement ef forts along the Escatawpa River, McDonald Road and Padgett Switch Road.
Goolsby said deputies, about six to 10 a shift, ride on horseback, in boats and in vehicles to spot drivers beckoned by wooded areas, dirt roads and construction zones.
Though ALDOT just extended its hand to the Sheriff’s Office this month, Goolsby said, he and other deputies began combating illegal ATVs about three years ago after complaints began pouring in from residents whose property had been damaged.
“It’s been this way for a while,” Goolsby said. “It starts up in the spring each year and then after Labor Day, it calms down.
“Some have been riding for years, and their attitude is, ‘I didn’t do that damage, I’m just riding the trail,’” he continued. “Every one of them is actually doing the damage. They are compounding the damage.”
Follow Us On Twitter/privateofficer
Join Us At MySpace/privateofficernews
Join The National Association of Private Officers
www.privateofficer.com
