Hundreds of wild places. Millions of roadless acres. One rule protects them all

For twenty-five years, a single rule has kept 44.5 million acres of America's wildest national forest off-limits to new roads. Behind that rule sit the Tongass and Chugach in Alaska, the headwaters of 354 municipal watersheds, habitat for more than 1,600 threatened and endangered species, and roughly thirty percent of the entire National Forest System. On June 23, 2025, USDA Secretary Brooke Rollins announced plans to undo it all in the service of exploitation.

The rule survived a quarter century for one reason: the record. Its 2001 enactment drew more than 1.6 million public comments — still the most for any federal rule in U.S. history. In 2025, the public responded to the Notice of Intent. Roughly 600,000 comments came in; a roadless.org analysis found more than 99.8% opposed rescission. A Pew survey (Feb 2026) measured 76% voter support for keeping the rule — bipartisan, across every region of the country.

The agency is proposing rescission anyway. What it is legally required to answer is not opposition as sentiment but rather substantive opposition on the record. Comments that name the studies. Comments that cite the watersheds, the species, the fire data. Comments that engage the agency's stated rationale on its own terms. This site is the working surface for that record: peer-reviewed research, primary documents, and a guided builder so what you submit becomes part of what the rule's fate is decided on. Your learning map and the comment tool guides you through comment creation and gives you immediate access to the issues, concerns, and arguments that yield a comment that the agency must respond to in the administrative record.

The Draft EIS was filed on August 18, 2026, and its Chosen Alternative is full rescission. The public comment window is open now and closes September 21 — a brief thirty days, and the agency is legally required to answer every substantive comment on the record. You have three ways to act. Start drafting your comment now — the tool saves your work so you can return and file it before the window closes. Contact your representatives; the agency has been clear it will not change its conclusion absent pressure from the public and Congress. And ask your delegation to cosponsor the Roadless Area Conservation Act (H.R. 3930 / S. 2042), which would write the rule into federal law so no administration could repeal it by regulation again. Contact your representative in Congress →