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Whatever one thinks of the American Recreation Coalition today, it's sometimes worth reminding oneself that the ARC is the creation of the petroleum industry and the makers of powered recreation vehicles. Transforming America's public lands into pay-to-play motorized playgrounds is not, and never was, their raison d'être. The transformation of recreation into wreckreation and the destruction of wildness, for which they are absolutely responsible, was merely the consequence of ARC serving their primary mission and masters.
Lets not forget that the ARC was born in 1979 as a response to the gas-crisis then gripping the nation. That crisis had caused the sales of recreation vehicles to plummet to zero. Something had to be done to SAVE THE INDUSTRY!
ARC was launched with unusual financial and political backing and quickly became the top outdoor recreation advisor to Presidents Reagan and Bush Senior. By the mid 90s, ARC dominated America's public lands recreation policy. It is in that role, as the masters of policy and the overseers of bureaucratic land managers, that most people are now familiar with the ARC. Yet just as vampires return to their crypt, when necessary the ARC returns to its oily roots. Few are familiar with those roots -- and roots matter.
Pasted below is a recent article describing how ARC is worried that the 110th Congress might raise federal corporate average fuel economy (CAFE) standards -- and by so doing, harm the recreation industry. You can be assured that if Congress takes up this issue, ARC will be lobbying against the raising of those fuel economy standards.
Scott
- TO LEARN THE BACKGROUND AND TO READ THE FOREWORD TO THE ARC-PUBLISHED BOOK PICTURED ABOVE, CLICK HERE.
- To get a sense of ARC's efforts as deny Climate Change, click here.
- To better appreciate ARC's efforts as SUV / anti-CAFE lobbyists, click here.
- To see how ARC and it's federal partners promote recreational gas consumption, click here.
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Regulatory Review: Future of tow vehicles at risk?
Boating Industry - December 22, 2006
WASHINGTON, D.C. - The American Recreation Coalition, concerned over
proposals to raise federal corporate average fuel economy (CAFE)
standards, is calling upon the newly-elected 110th Congress, which will
take office in 2007, to consider the full implications of such
proposals.
"Light trucks are practically the only vehicles on the market that can
safely tow outdoor gear for quality family outdoor fun," the group said
in a recent statement, suggesting that higher CAFE standards would put
the future of these vehicles in danger.
"In the late 1970s, shortly after federal corporate average fuel
economy (CAFE) standards took effect, nearly 70 percent of domestic
passenger car models were capable of towing 2,100 pounds or more, about
the size of an average bass fishing boat and trailer," the group
pointed out. "By 1986, because cars had been downsized dramatically to
meet ever-increasing CAFE standards, only 20 percent could tow that
load. By the mid-1990s, the percentage slipped to 12 percent, and
today, only 1 percent of domestic passenger cars can tow 2,100 pounds."
If the CAFE standards were increased "beyond affordable technological
limits," the group predicts that automakers would be forced to either
manufacture smaller and less powerful light trucks or discontinue them
altogether, "which would force families currently driving large and
mid-size SUVs to drive smaller vehicles unable to support outdoor fun."
"There are more than 11 million trailerable boats and 5 million
trailerable RVs in use across America," the group concluded. "Millions
more Americans tow horses, snowmobiles, ATVs and personal watercraft.
To safely tow this equipment to outdoor fun, we need vehicles with
adequate towing, braking and visibility characteristics."
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- Outdoor recreation 
