A central theme in FSC certification is public access to certified forestlands. Landowners are encouraged through the certification process to allow traditional recreational activities, ranging from hiking and mountain biking, to fishing, hunting and snowmobiling. The standards directly address customary use rights and the maintenance of those rights. Although this may sound like a burden for landowners, many FSC-certified forest management units have demonstrated clear management benefits from opening public access, including benefits beyond simply improved public relations.

Public access, when established under conservation and shared stewardship models, has assisted management of FSC-certified lands in many ways. FSC certificate holders have experienced benefits of public access in a variety of avenues, including: control of damage to timber resources, maintenance of roads and gates, reporting vandalism and other damaging activities, assistance in locating and monitoring sensitive areas and species, and creating business-oriented positive public relations. Public access, along with a proactive outreach to public users, has resulted in users developing a proprietary relationship with the lands that does not inhibit the management of a profitable working forest. This amounts to management and vigilance of the privately-held lands that landowners may not have the resources to provide management for.

The trend in forestry and land ownership in New Hampshire during the 1990s and early 2000s wasn’t that of model stewardship, according to Johanna Lyons of the New Hampshire Department of Resources and Economic Development. Forested lands were purchased, heavily cut, and then sold. This trend was a significant concern for the Trust for Public Lands when they searched for a new partner in forging an innovative relationship between a working forest operation, conservation, and public access.

The Lyme Timber Company had a relatively long history of creating partnerships with conservation organizations or government agencies for shared ownership of forested lands and recognized the values of reducing management costs that lead to both economic and conservation benefits. They seemed like a logical choice as a partner in ownership.

Lyme Timber’s Connecticut Lakes Property is now 146,000 acres of FSC-certified timberland located in northern New Hampshire. Shortly after Lyme Timber acquired the land in 2002, and as part of their purchase agreement with the Trust for Public Lands, it sold the ownership of the 400 miles of roads and the public access and recreation rights for the entire parcel to the State of New Hampshire through a conservation easement. Lyme Timber, New Hampshire’s Division of Parks and Recreation, and the Trust for Public Lands recognized the situation as one in which goals for maintenance of public access, profitable management of the forest, and environmental stewardship all could be permanently achieved through partnership. In the innovative relationship, the conservation agreement explicitly requires that the State of New Hampshire review and approve Lyme Timber’s forest management plans, and likewise that Lyme Timber review and approve the State’s recreation plan. For Lyme Timber, this translates to significant reductions in management costs associated with maintenance of the road and gate system and liability for public users.

The recreation plan guarantees all recreational rights that do not diminish the environmental aspects of the landscape—for example, ATV use is allowed only on the roads. This includes hunting, fishing, hiking, sightseeing, equestrian uses, and snowmobiling (the number one recreational use of the land). The special quality of the Connecticut Lakes property, beyond its sheer size, is that it offers an increasingly rare opportunity for public users to use undeveloped land. In addition, the State maintains a large system of snowmobile routes, large game and upland birds thrive throughout the property, and fishermen can fish on some of the few undeveloped lakes in the region.

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