Bikepacking Roots represents the unique interests of bikepackers, which also vary across the diverse places where bikepackers recreate across the United States and Canada. While we share many interests with other user groups, we have our own perspective on the experiences we seek and the landscapes that matter to us.

We organize our advocacy work across three key themes:

  • Balancing Conservation and Access: We work to protect the landscapes and support the communities through which we traverse. We recognize that as bikepackers, wild places enable and shape our adventures, and that we have an interest in and responsibility to help protect them.
  • Facilitating the Bikepacking Experience: We work to lower barriers to bikepacking by improving and expanding camping options for cyclists and supporting efforts to make travel to reach bikepacking destinations easier.
  • Supporting an Inclusive & Diverse Bikepacking Community: As the bikepacking community grows, we strive to foster a supportive, responsible, and inclusive community of bikepackers for people of all identities and experience levels. We recognize the history of exclusion and inequitable representation in outdoor recreation, so we welcome and elevate marginalized voices.

Below we elaborate on our stances across these key themes*:

Balancing Conservation and Access

Some of the best bikepacking is in big, wild places. These places deserve protection. We believe that public land conservation and access go hand in hand. By protecting public lands from unsustainable, destructive forces, we maintain ecosystems, support local economies, and ensure there will be a future for bikepacking and recreation. We also believe that you can’t love what you don’t know. By facilitating the human-nature connection through bikepacking, we believe we are encouraging a connection that will inspire a conservation ethic and action. We support federal, state, and other land managers as they increasingly recognize the link between conservation and recreation access.

We advocate for continued public ownership and increased protections for public lands, and to prevent harm from development and extractive industries. We support designations that protect public lands while not adversely affecting appropriate access for bikepackers, whether those designations may be National Park, National Monument, Wilderness, Special Recreation Area, or something else.

We also advocate for bikepackers’ access to public lands. But we recognize that healthy landscapes are complex and interconnected webs of competing interests, including the geography, ecosystems, watersheds, and human communities in a region. As such, we are willing to prioritize the health of a larger landscape over immediate bicycle access if needed.

We believe public land management requires respect, compromise, and cooperation. We also believe public land managers should take the latest science into account when considering access for human-powered travel. We will partner with land managers and organizations that support public lands, and we will speak up to protect and facilitate access to appropriate bikepacking destinations.

We recognize that bikepackers ride on land stolen from Indigenous groups, and that our current public land designations are rooted in problematic historical perspectives, which can perpetuate racism and the erasure of BIPOC people. We believe landscapes cannot be whole without Indigenous voices in land.

Examples of our work:

  • Successful passage of the Biking on Long Distance Trails (BOLT) Act in 2024 as part of the EXPLORE Act, a package of bills to improve and expand access to the outdoors. We are now co-leading a coalition with IMBA and People for Bikes that is engaging in the prioritization process for BOLT trails, more info coming soon!
  • Advocacy for protection of the Bears Ears and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monuments that were reduced by President Trump in 2017 and restored by President Biden in 2021. We continue to actively advocate for public lands that are at risk to an unprecedented degree.

Facilitating the Bikepacking Experience

Camping Access: We recognize that a bikepacking trip can look different depending on where you live and are able to bikepack. Access to legal places to camp presents a barrier to many bikepackers in parts of the country without large swaths of public land that allow dispersed camping. Logistics are often complicated further when pace, mechanicals, weather and other factors may make it difficult to plan sleeping locations in advance. We support efforts for expanding no-turn-away policies and the availability of hiker/biker campsites at public campgrounds.

Transit accessibility: We want to facilitate more options for bikepackers to travel to reach bikepacking routes in ways that can reduce the reliance on car travel. We advocate for improvement in bike travel by train to expand opportunities to access more bikepacking routes by train across the country. We are also focusing on the development of more bikepacking routes closer to cities and suburban areas or accessible by public transportation.

Safety: We will support local advocacy groups who are advocating for safe cycling routes from cities and other population dense areas if there is a linkage to existing or potential bikepacking routes.

Examples of our work:

  • We are a member of the national Amtrak Bike Task Force whose goal is to make bike travel by train easier and more convenient.
  • We are a member of the newly formed Bicycle Camping Coalition, which aims to expand hiker/biker campsites and improve no-turn away policies at public campgrounds across the United States.

Supporting an Inclusive & Diverse Bikepacking Community

We believe that bicycles and the outdoors are for all, and that everyone should have access to the freedom, joy and self-actualization they provide. We also know that there are many barriers to multi-day self-supported adventures to be dismantled before beginning to bikepack, such as finances, equipment, confidence, experience, camping skills, and access to routes.

We develop free educational programming to increase skills and confidence for bikepackers and aspiring bikepackers. Through our Regional Stewards program, we host beginner-focused Community Campouts to provide inclusive spaces for diverse bikepackers.

We recognize the history of exclusion and inequitable representation in outdoor recreation, so we endeavor to uplift the work of individuals and groups that are centering the needs and safety of BIPOC and LGBTQ+ riders. Through our BIPOC Bike Adventure Grant program, we are supporting BIPOC community leaders to host trips, develop gear libraries, and other community building activities.

Examples of our work:

*These views reflect some of our key areas of focus for Bikepacking Roots’ Advocacy work but are not an exhaustive list. As issues arise that impact the bikepacking community, we will assess our capacity and positioning to get involved in additional related advocacy efforts.

How we work:

  • We connect bikepackers to landscapes and inspire conservation advocacy and a positive impact ethos by providing environmental education and sharing advocacy issues relevant to bikepacking routes.
  • We speak up when elected officials consider decisions that affect the bikepacking community to elevate the awareness of bikepackers as a user group and to ensure that our interests are considered.
  • We cooperate with land managers and with other user groups to promote land conservation and bikepacking access.
  • We form collaborative partnerships with other organizations and coalitions with overlapping advocacy priorities and will play a leadership or supporting role as needed.
  • We support local and regional advocacy issues through a network of Regional Advocacy Stewards and will lend our voice and expertise strategically to amplify the efforts of local advocacy groups.
  • We build relationships with local community stakeholders along existing and potential bikepacking routes to strengthen the linkage between bikepacking to rural economic development initiatives.
  • We partner with multidisciplinary groups to amplify our voice.

Photo credit: Gabriel Tiller, Jan Bennett