OAR 629-625-0000: Purpose

(1) Forest roads are essential to forest management and contribute to providing jobs, products, tax base, and other social and economic benefits. (2) OAR 629-625-0000 through 629-625-0920 shall be known as the road construction and maintenance rules. (3) The purpose of the road construction and maintenance rules is to establish standards for locating, designing, constructing, and maintaining efficient and beneficial forest roads; locating and operating rock pits and quarries; identifying active and inactive roads that have fish passage barriers or contribute sediment to waters of the state, to correct conditions; and to vacate roads, rock pits, and quarries that are no longer needed in manners that provide the maximum practical protection to maintain forest productivity, water quality, and fish and wildlife habitat. (4) To achieve the goals of the division, all roads will be designed, constructed, improved, maintained, or vacated to: (a) Prevent or minimize sediment delivery to waters of the state; (b) Ensure passage for covered species during all mobile life-history stages; (c) Prevent or minimize drainage or unstable sidecast in areas where mass wasting could deliver sediment to public resources or threaten public safety; (d) Prevent or minimize hydrologic alterations of the channel; (e) Prevent or minimize impacts to stream bank stability, existing stream channel, and riparian vegetation; (f) To the maximum extent practicable, hydrologically disconnect forest roads and landings from waters of the state; and (g) Avoid, minimize, and mitigate loss of wetland function. (5) The road construction and maintenance rules shall apply to all forest practices regions unless otherwise indicated.