§535 Forest Development Roads; Acquisition, Construction, and Maintenance; Maximum Economy; Methods of Financing; Cost Arrangements for Construction Standards; Transfer of Unused Effective Purchaser Credit for Road Construction

Summary

The Secretary can plan, build, and keep up roads in and near national forests and other Forest Service lands. The roads must be placed and built so timber from lands served by those roads can be taken out as cheaply as possible, while still protecting, developing, and managing the land and using other resources wisely. Payment can come from federal money, charges on buyers of timber and other products (including paying road costs over time in contracts), cost-sharing with public or private partners, or any mix of these. If a road is built to a higher standard than needed for the sale, the buyer does not have to pay the extra cost for that higher standard. The Secretary can also allow a buyer to move unused road-construction credit earned after December 16, 1975, from one timber sale to another for the same buyer in the same National Forest, under rules the Secretary makes.