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WASHINGTON - A Bush administration policy aimed at re-opening access to more than 58 million acres of roadless national forests closed off under President Clinton was struck down Wednesday by a federal judge in California.

U.S. District Judge Elizabeth Laporte said the Bush administration failed to do the adequate environmental reviews on its new policies, which affect nearly a third of the forests nationwide, including more than 4 million acres of inventoried roadless forests lands in Utah, about half of the national forests in the state.

"The American people have spoken loud and clear on this issue and they want these valuable public lands protected," said Anna Aurilio, legislative director of U.S. Public Interest Research Group.

The Clinton administration enacted a forest policy as it was leaving office in January 2001 that essentially prohibited road construction and timber harvests in roadless forest areas.

The rule was the product of three years of review and 600 public hearings.

President Bush delayed implementation of the rule and, after several starts and stops and legal challenges, last year issued a new policy, which allows governors to petition the Forest Service to amend roadless management in their states, including recognizing new roadless areas.

Lynn Stevens, public lands policy coordinator for Gov. Jon Huntsman Jr., said the governor has been working on a plan for Utah forests that "addresses the overall multiple use of the forest," and plans to submit it to the Forest Service when it is due in November.

"Until we get other guidelines, we're responding to the Bush administration's direction," Stevens said.

But critics of Utah's roadless petition process believe the state will have to adhere to the new judicial ruling, at least until it can be sorted out on appeal.

"The Utah plan is not premised on protection. It's premised on allowing state and county planners to go through Utah's roadless inventory [about 5 million acres] and throw out all the conservation measures they don't like," said Kevin Mueller, executive director of the Utah Environmental Congress.

Michael Swenson, executive director of the Utah Shared Access Alliance, an off-highway vehicle advocacy group, said he was still reviewing Wednesday's decision, but would have liked to seen the administration's policy upheld.

"We're not going away. We're not saying this is over. We're hopeful that an appropriate remedy can be struck to protect access to valuable recreation areas," Swenson said.

Twenty environmental groups and attorneys general from four states challenged the Bush rule in court, arguing that the administration did not comply with the required environmental assessments and endangered species reviews before enacting the rule. Laporte agreed.

According to court filings, three times in 2004 and 2005 the Bureau of Land Management sold oil and gas leases in inventoried roadless areas in Utah's Uinta National Forest, totalling about 40,000 acres around Strawberry Reservoir and in the Diamond Fork area.

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JOE BAIRD contributed to this story.