This section describes potential impacts to recreational uses of public lands under the alternatives in terms of direct, indirect, short-term, and long-term impacts.

Direct impacts to recreation affect the recreational resources, settings, experiences, and ultimately the desired beneficial outcomes from uses on public lands, including hunting, motorized travel (including OHV use), target shooting, wildlife viewing, camping, and other activities. Direct impacts also include impacts to recreational facilities such as campsites. Certain resource development or management actions (e.g., oil and gas development, fire and fuels management) will interfere with realizing desired beneficial outcomes, which will displace recreational users from their desired setting-specific areas, resulting in direct adverse impacts to recreation. Indirect impacts occur when competing uses of the land adversely affect natural recreational resources or recreational setting character conditions (RSCC) that no longer support desired experiences and beneficial outcomes. For example, impacts to wildlife habitats from competing land uses that result in a decrease in big game populations will therefore decrease the hunting (recreational) opportunities, and impact the experiences and beneficial outcomes.

Beneficial impacts to recreational resources include actions that improve the desired RSCC, increase recreational opportunities, contribute to better recreational experiences, and ultimately contribute to increase realized beneficial outcomes from recreational use of the public lands. Managing areas as SRMAs and ERMAs benefit recreation by managing for the desired RSCC, and marketing (niche matching) based on identified desired settings, activities, experiences, and benefits. Adverse impacts are those that degrade the desired RSCC, reduce the amount of recreation opportunity, and detract from the recreation experience, resulting in unrealized desired beneficial outcomes for recreational users.