East entrance likely to see little impactNational Park Service officials signed off on a new, temporary winter use plan for Yellowstone last week, which will cut snowmobile limits by more than half.Over the next two winters, no more than 318 commercially guided snowmobiles, with best available technology, will be allowed in the park each day. That's down from the 720 level used the past five winter seasons. Maximum daily snowcoach use will stay constant at 78 machines per day.

The temporary plan, completed on Thursday, will serve as a placeholder while the Park Service drafts a new permanent plan regulating winter use in Yellowstone.

That process is scheduled to begin this winter with scoping — a surveying of public comment and opinion.

At that point, the park service will begin considering all options — from completely phasing out snowmobiles to allowing thousands of them.

“We rule everything in as we begin the scoping process,” said Yellowstone spokesman Al Nash, calling the scoping “the best opportunity for the public to comment.”

Had the new levels been in effect over the past several seasons, park officials have said that snowmobilers would have been turned away one out of every three days.

“It certainly will have an impact, on especially the West and South (Entrance) numbers for the park,” said Yellowstone Management Assistant John Sacklin.

The West Entrance will now be allowed 160 snowmobiles and 34 snowcoaches, the South Entrance 114 sleds and 13 coaches, the East Entrance 20 snowmobiles and 2 coaches, the North Entrance 12 and 13, and Old Faithful will be allowed 12 sleds and 16 coaches.

Daily machine limits at the east gate are dropping from 40 per day to 20, but that's unlikely to have an impact — 20 of its sleds were not allocated to anyone last year. The lone licensed East Entrance operator, Gary Fales Outfitting of Rimrock Ranch, will continue to receive a 20-sled allocation. High Country Adventures is continuing to receive two snowcoach trips per day.

Despite the Park Service's decision, whether the 318-rule will remain in place is still a bit of a live legal question.

The state of Wyoming has asked a federal district court judge to block the cut, and that case still is pending.

Sacklin declined to comment when asked about the pending lawsuit last week.

“We don't want to speculate on what may or may not be the outcome of the litigation,” he said.

The interim plan completed last week explicitly states that it is only a stopgap measure in the contentious debate over snowmobile use in Yellowstone.

“The winter use debate is a contest of values, with those who dislike snowmobiles believing that their impacts are unacceptable and that the vehicles should be banned, and those who prefer snowmobile access arguing that the adverse affects are minor and that (the National Park Service) has been too restrictive in managing that access,” reads a section of the document. “This interim plan does not attempt to resolve that dispute.”