Red Rock Vanlife Busted?

Tanner Jameswrote:

The same people that are screaming “dirtbagging is dead! There are no more real dirt bags left, everyone is rich and entitled!” Are the same lunatics chastising people for not wanting to pay $210 for a weeks campsite to climb somewhere. I live in a van specifically to be able to travel more and live as frugally as possible in order to facilitate that. It’s not reasonable to have to pay $30+ a night for a campsite I'm just going to park my van for 8 hours during the night and leave zero trace. These options aren’t sustainable, even if there was 10,000 campsites im simply not paying that much money when there is public land. And if there isn’t public land I’ll find somewhere low key. Pick a lane, either say the you hate dirt bags everywhere and climbing/camping is for rich people now and we should continue to charge people to use their own public land daily, or don’t.

I’m not advocating for being able to pitch a tent on the side of the road and get a fire going, that would be leaving a trace obviously. But the vans aren’t going anywhere any time soon and it’s not being addressed as a legitimate option for some odd reason. I am positive no one is getting high blood pressure over professional climbers living in vans to dedicate more time to traveling and climbing, where’s the line?

Maybe you're not rich and entitled, though some could argue the latter with the language in your post. 

The fact is you live a privileged life. 

Ashortwrote:

The fact is you live a privileged life. 

Lame. Tanner works his ass off and is a valued member of our community. Not a trust funder like you would wish to believe…

Greg Daviswrote:

Lame. Tanner works his ass off and is a valued member of our community.

I never heard of him. Whose community are you referring to?

Ashortwrote:

Maybe you're not rich and entitled, though some could argue the latter with the language in your post. 

The fact is you live a privileged life. 

I don’t want to spend $30 a night to sleep in my car so I’m privileged? 

I am finishing 10 years in the military and my wife and I moved into the van in order to try to make up for lost time when I’m done. It blows my mind how quickly someone will pass condescending judgement on someone you’ve never met. I sincerely hope you typed that out emotionally charged with no real thought into it. 

Tanner Jameswrote:

I don’t want to spend $30 a night to sleep in my car so I’m privileged? 

I am finishing 10 years in the military and my wife and I moved into the van in order to try to make up for lost time when I’m done. It blows my mind how quickly someone will pass condescending judgement on someone you’ve never met. I sincerely hope you typed that out emotionally charged with no real thought into it. 

There is no emotion behind my statement of fact. Nor was there condescension, I too live a privileged life. Being able to travel freely while living in a vehicle and pursuing your hobbies is most certainly a privilege. If you take that much offense at the statement maybe some self reflection is in order. 

I have no moral or ethical objections to people parking overnight at the detention basin. However, I do think that it's bad optics for climbers. Yeah yeah not all climbers, but we are the most visible and damaging user group in Red Rock. I will not advocate for parking at the detention basin as there are more important fights in red rock right now.

Many climbing areas I've been to require a 30 to 45 minute drive from the free public land camping to the actual climbing. For some reason Vegas is the one place where people complain about this, why? Vegas is a absolutely surrounded by public land, find some and make the commute. That's my opinion on it and many local disagree with me. 

Yeah I don't know you, but your post came off pretty entitled. A city of 2 million people that is driven by private development is not gonna bend over to allow you a free place to store you personal property for your vacation. Do I agree with that? No. Is that the reality, yes. Red rock is under intense pressure to limit recreational uses, and imo the detention basin is a bad look on climbers. 

You asked where to draw the line... Why should a van be able to park there but I can't put a tent? Can only voluntarily homeless people stay there? Only climbers? Only people in a van, what about a subaru? Where do you draw the line indeed? Personally I think only verified homeless meth addicts should be able to sleep at he dettention basin.

IF you wanna advocate for something advocate for them to not develop the gypsum mine and to instead develop recreational facilities, such as an overnight RV parking area. IMO fighting to park at the detention basin is bad optics and not a fight worth having in the reality of Vegas. 

Again, right now the detention basin is as busy as ever. We'll see how long that lasts. 

Ashort makes a great point above. There are bigger fights for locals in RR right now. Non-locals coming in and poorly representing the climbing community as a whole by squatting on the side of the road does not help our cause at all. Many people don't differentiate between local climbers and illegal dirtbaggers, so we get lumped in together...and then everyone suffers the same eventual consequences (like lack of or limited access).

As a mountain biker and trail runner who travels frequently to partake, I often wonder why those communities don't have these same issues...

edit: just to clarify, I didn't mean to imply "locals only, bruh." I was just pointing out that locals aren't the ones everyone sees squatting at Skid Row. 

Non locals in vegas? I'd bet vegas as a whole is about 2% locals, just sayin...

EMFR Iwrote:

Ashort makes a great point above. There are bigger fights for locals in RR right now. Non-locals coming in and poorly representing the climbing community as a whole by squatting on the side of the road does not help our cause at all. Many people don't differentiate between local climbers and illegal dirtbaggers, so we get lumped in together...and then everyone suffers the same eventual consequences (like lack of or limited access).

As a mountain biker and trail runner who travels frequently to partake, I often wonder why those communities don't have these same issues...

The mountain biking, at least in red rock, is not as visible as climbing. People out hiking off the loop road will encounter climbers but not mountain bikers. The MTB trails are all over near the late night trailhead and blue diamond hill, not off the loop proper. Also the places climbers go in red rock would rarely, if ever, see any people if climbing didn't exist. Therefore, the environmental impacts from climbers are much greater. There is also an elitist attitude from some climbers that our pursuits are somehow more valid or pure than other pursuits. Then you have the idea expressed in this thread, that since you decided to live in a vehicle to pursue your hobby everyone else must accommodate that choice. We even had one poster insinuating (wrongly) that Vegas let's homeless people camp but rousts van dwellers. Like hey man, you are going after the WRONG homeless people. None of this looks good on our community, but that's just my opinion, and I'm just an idiot. 

Well this is fun. 

Tanner Jameswrote:

The same people that are screaming “dirtbagging is dead! There are no more real dirt bags left, everyone is rich and entitled!” Are the same lunatics chastising people for not wanting to pay $210 for a weeks campsite to climb somewhere. I live in a van specifically to be able to travel more and live as frugally as possible in order to facilitate that. It’s not reasonable to have to pay $30+ a night for a campsite I'm just going to park my van for 8 hours during the night and leave zero trace. These options aren’t sustainable, even if there was 10,000 campsites im simply not paying that much money when there is public land. And if there isn’t public land I’ll find somewhere low key. Pick a lane, either say the you hate dirt bags everywhere and climbing/camping is for rich people now and we should continue to charge people to use their own public land daily, or don’t.

I’m not advocating for being able to pitch a tent on the side of the road and get a fire going, that would be leaving a trace obviously. But the vans aren’t going anywhere any time soon and it’s not being addressed as a legitimate option for some odd reason. I am positive no one is getting high blood pressure over professional climbers living in vans to dedicate more time to traveling and climbing, where’s the line?

"I live in a van specifically to be able to travel more and live as frugally as possible in order to facilitate that."
Congratulations on your amazing journey of self-discovery. Obviously we are all very happy for you.

If you want to live "frugally" by not paying rent/camping fees in a desirable locale with a lot of visitors, that's not zero trace, especially when there are a lot of you around. And yes rent-paying, mortgage-holding locals can see you plain as day. Visit the East Mapleton Avenue RV Park in Boulder any day to see it all in real life

Living in Vegas, whether one pays taxes or a mortgage, is not exactly “low impact“. I’m sure many of us have read Cadillac Desert…..

Terry Ewrote:

Living in Vegas, whether one pays taxes or a mortgage, is not exactly “low impact“. I’m sure many of us have read Cadillac Desert…..

yeah no doubt about that but LNT van life is fictional

Terry Ewrote:

Living in Vegas, whether one pays taxes or a mortgage, is not exactly “low impact“. I’m sure many of us have read Cadillac Desert…..

Ha! that reminds me.....in 2007 i drove a 97 Cadillac Deville (that was given to me for free) down black velvet road. that thing floated all the way to the trailed and back! smooth like butter, cool like ice.

carry on.

jcs

Terry Ewrote:

Living in Vegas, whether one pays taxes or a mortgage, is not exactly “low impact“. I’m sure many of us have read Cadillac Desert…..

This will probably get lots of likes because pointing out that Vegas uses water is always a popular gotcha. Since you are so educated on the subject, can you elaborate how the colorado river resources are allocated? 

ETA: 

I know the answer, but I have found, and you have demonstrated, that most people that bring up Vegas and water speak before understanding the issue. The colorado river serves roughly 40 million people. Nevada's take from Lake Mead is 300,000 acre-feet/year (which was recently reduced) or less than 2% the annual colorado river allocation, which is 16.5 million acre-feet/year. 

To be fair, while running the water in your house is wasteful as it takes recourses to treat and deliver the water, 99% of indoor household water use in Vegas is treated and returned to lake mead. It is considered a net zero use. Watering your grass however....

Another interesting fact is that over the last 20 years Vegas' population has grown by 800,000 but water use has been reduced by 23%. 

M Mwrote:

Non locals in vegas? I'd bet vegas as a whole is about 2% locals, just sayin...

You are almost correct. Of the 200k climbers who visit RRC every year, only 2k of us live here (stat pulled from BLM RAMP proposal). So, 1%. 

And yes, all of the activities of visiting climbers have an impact on those of us who live here year round. For example, Calico Basin is going to be placed under a management plan, largely because of the impact climbers have had on the area.

With regards to Skid Row, I'm surprised nobody has mentioned yet what its actual purpose is. When we have flash floods, that's where all the storm water drains so that Summerlin is spared. Can you imagine if we had a flash flood with several dozen vanlifers parked in that catchment? It would be a nightmare. Yes, this is the desert, but it does rain, and that catchment does fill up a couple of times per year. And when it does, it happens in like 5 minutes.

Like others have said, we have a lot of bigger issues to deal with (out of state climbers who refuse to use wag bags in the park, dogs that shit at the crag or on trail, destruction of incredibly delicate habitat, gumbies TRing through fixed gear, etc.), but it's still a bad look on the entire climbing community. You have all of Lovell Canyon to camp. Why do you need to squat in a flash flood catchment across from half million dollar homes (the owners of which have much more pull than our community when it comes to restrictions)?

Yea at $210 a week you should be able to rent a nice room in vegas, even a studio apartment if it wasn't airbnb vrbo pricey.

Ashort, Nevada electricity use is not carbon neutral or low impact. Without 24 hour per day air conditioning, the hotter parts of Nevada would be unlivable from May to October. That's a whole lot of power coming from coal fired plants.

Ashortwrote:

This will probably get lots of likes because pointing out that Vegas uses water is always a popular gotcha. Since you are so educated on the subject, can you elaborate how the colorado river resources are allocated? 

ETA: 

I know the answer, but I have found, and you have demonstrated, that most people that bring up Vegas and water speak before understanding the issue. The colorado river serves roughly 40 million people. Nevada's take from Lake Mead is 300,000 acre-feet/year (which was recently reduced) or less than 2% the annual colorado river allocation, which is 16.5 million acre-feet/year. 

To be fair, while running the water in your house is wasteful as it takes recourses to treat and deliver the water, 99% of indoor household water use in Vegas is treated and returned to lake mead. It is considered a net zero use. Watering your grass however....

Another interesting fact is that over the last 20 years Vegas' population has grown by 800,000 but water use has been reduced by 23%. 

Diego Climberwrote:

Ashort, Nevada electricity use is not carbon neutral or low impact. Without 24 hour per day air conditioning, the hotter parts of Nevada would be unlivable from May to October. That's a whole lot of power coming from coal fired plants.

Seems people on this site just can't stop posting infactial information. It's not like it's hard to look this up. NV energy get power from one coal fired power plant in northern nevada, which represents a tiny fraction of their portfolio. The majority of energy comes from natural gas, and yeah that still produces a ton of emissions. Personally I have solar that produces more than I use, the excess of which feeds back into the grid. Honestly, I don't know if that is reflected in the numbers on their website. 

Forget electricity, the fact is that air conditioning is one of the biggest water uses in Vegas, and yeah that's an issue. That's more to do with the big cooling towers for the resorts, and i can't imagine how much that new google data center uses, there's like 100 giant cooling towers there. And don't get me started on the overuse of the ultra wealthy here. 

All these are issues that need addressing, but at least be factual when doing it. 

For anyone that is actually interested in the greenhouse gasses that Clark County emits, you don't have to guess like Not My Name, you can go here and download the The Regional Community Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Inventory. The report breaks down emissions by sector, and according to the report electricity (including AC) accounts for 33.5% of greenhouse emissions in Clark County. 

https://www.clarkcountynv.gov/government/departments/environment_and_sustainability/sustainability/all-in_clark_county/ghgreport.php

Ashortwrote:

For anyone that is actually interested in the greenhouse gasses that Clark County emits, you don't have to guess like Not My Name, you can go here and download the The Regional Community Greenhouse Gas (GHG) Inventory. The report breaks down emissions by sector, and according to the report electricity (including AC) accounts for 33.5% of greenhouse emissions in Clark County. 

https://www.clarkcountynv.gov/government/departments/environment_and_sustainability/sustainability/all-in_clark_county/ghgreport.php

There’s nothing I want to do more than download the GHG inventory for Clark county.