It’s been four months since a highly controversial trail project in Colorado gained major funding — what proponents and opponents thought would break a yearslong stalemate.

Still, the Mad Rabbit project is showing no signs of progress.

That’s the view of Routt County Riders and Keep Routt Wild, two Steamboat Springs groups that have long led the push for and against a sweeping trail system off Rabbit Ears Pass.

Mountain bikers with the former have seen a destination hardly matched across the state — about 50 miles of trail for every type or rider — while hunters and conservationists with the latter see harm to wildlife and lands meant to be preserved.

An hourslong debate in December during a Steamboat Springs City Council meeting underscored controversy spanning close to a decade — controversy that’s been called “a classic New West battle” stretching far beyond Steamboat. It’s a battle between recreation and conservation, between ideas of tourism and economic growth and local quality of life.

At the end of that debate, the City Council approved $1.6 million for trail construction.

But Routt County Riders and Keep Routt Wild see nothing imminent.

It might already be past time to have secured a contractor to build the first trails this summer, said a representative with Routt County Riders. Meanwhile, Keep Routt Wild has hoped cameras would be installed by now for monitoring elk that have been of concern under the Mad Rabbit proposal.

The U.S. Forest Service has yet to sign an environmental assessment that was initially published in 2023.

“If this EA doesn’t get approved and those cameras are not deployed before elk calving, I don’t see how the project could go ahead this year,” said Larry Desjardin, Keep Routt Wild’s board president.

From an interview request sent to the Forest Service and Colorado Parks and Wildlife, the Forest Service provided a statement saying “the Mad Rabbit project is progressing.” 

The agency added: “We continue to work with our partners, value their work, and anticipate positive outcomes we can achieve together.” 

Late last year, advocates saw the Forest Service and CPW apparently come to terms after the Colorado Department of Natural Resources in 2023 submitted a 10-page objection to the environmental assessment and finding of no significant impact. The state echoed Keep Routt Wild’s objections, criticizing the Forest Service’s “outdated methodology” and suggesting Mad Rabbit trails would infringe upon elk habitat and upon the legal boundaries of Colorado Roadless Areas.

Late last year, advocates heard the Forest Service and CPW lay out an adaptive management strategy, as called for in the objection letter. The call was “procedural guidance for tracking, assessing and responding to changes in resource conditions,” ensuring “Colorado Roadless Area characteristics, sensitive wildlife habitat objectives and related biological management objectives to guide future decisions for maintaining desired conditions.”

Advocates heard the adaptive management agreement in a meeting of the Routt Recreation and Conservation Roundtable. The agreement seemingly cleared the way for Steamboat City Council’s funding in December.

But since then, “it’s kind of in limbo,” said Craig Frithsen, Routt County Riders’ board president.

He wondered about local impacts from cuts across the federal government. “The Forest Service, who knows, they’re in disarray essentially at this point,” Frithsen said. “We don’t know what’s going on.”

The Routt Recreation and Conservation Roundtable first convened five years ago — the local counterpart of state-funded coalitions formed to address such regional issues. Tensions had been simmering long since then, since 2013, when Mad Rabbit was seen as a priority under new funding for trails approved by Steamboat voters.

The Forest Service started scoping in 2017, raising tensions more.

“That’s why the roundtable started. People were calling mountain bikers whatever names, people were calling hunters names,” Frithsen said. “It was definitely back and forth like that.”

In January, moderators of the Routt Recreation and Conservation Roundtable released what Frithsen called “a guiding document” for local land managers and decision makers — a 25-page report of principles, goals and strategies after a long series of meetings.

“I’m favorably inclined to it,” Desjardin said.

But it did not settle disagreements over Mad Rabbit.

“I think proponents and opponents have staked out their own positions by now,” Desjardin said. “It’s not clear any more discussion is going to solve this.”

The adaptive management strategy does not fully ease Keep Routt Wild’s worries; the group still foresees 3,900 acres of habitat loss by Mad Rabbit’s full rollout. But Desjardin and fellow board members are supporting the approach.

Adaptive management “could in theory keep the project within the bounds of the finding of no significant impact,” he said.

And beyond that: “It could be a model for the entire state on how to do this, especially when it comes to contentious projects like these.”

Such projects have inspired those “New West” debates about recreation and conservation. Advocates on either side “have drawn a line in the sand,” Frithsen said.

From where he stands, he’s seen Mad Rabbit trails scaled back over the years — “over 60% of what was originally proposed,” he said.

But he still has hope for it. “I think eventually something will come out of it.”