Interestingly, here in Denmark it seems to be the other way around. Some fairly sensitive areas get developed for recreation and I am not always cool with that. Especially, because they nearly always build IMBA-approved bobsled runs with no root to be seen and bermkake overload. RIP this amazing area that is (was?) full of amphibians.There's been no wilderness reversal (which would require another congressional motion/legislation) since the original Wilderness act was signed into law. Like SS says, most people have no idea what the designation actually means. We have an entire mountain range in CA where no mtb trail will ever exist above 10k elevation, with mountains that go to 14k just because someone thought the most remote, inhospitable lands must somehow be protected from being 'overrun'. Now the belt notch peaks get over run with urbanites shitting all over an easily accessed trail to the top, and calling in rescues from altitude sickness
Most of the large, long-standing designated areas were what was intended. The entire country was inventoried in the early 70s and truth be told, most of what was deemed suitable already is designated.
The act and its intent has been co-opted by a grifter cOnSeRvAtIoN non-profit movement that sells the idea of wild lands (which we have a lot of) to expensive donors when they move close to undeveloped land. It's literally a business that supports extremely well paying jobs selling the product of wilderness to big donors now. What was initially an idea to preserve some land FOR RECREATION from strip mining and clear cutting, has become a business model for rich people to give the illusion that they saved some animal that was never in danger, all while increasing the property values of the mansion they just bought in the mountains.
It's part of the reason I ride a dirtbike now. In and out of these places quicker than on an mtb. They never stop making new ones so much like most native peoples should do, treat lines on a map as lines on a map only for the people that drew them. The rest of us just have to ignore them. They ignore local people different from them when they draw these boundaries, so local people different from them should ignore the product.
I remember when living in OR that the expansion of Mt Hood wilderness caused some major concerns in the MTB community. AFAIK the bill passed in 2009-ish, locking out MTB-ers. Friend of mine that lived there for some time longer told me that the hikers were bitching because the trails grew over as it previously was the MTB community that did the majority of trail work.
