The simple $6,500 all-terrain vehicle with a motorcycle seat, a couple storage racks and a winch is being left in the dust by sophisticated utility terrain vehicles that include heat, air conditioning, stereos, seat belts, up to six seats and $35,000 price tags.
As more counties and cities legalize both ATVs and their luxury UTV cousins on paved roads, Wisconsin residents are embracing the sight of these vehicles in towns and at restaurants, bars and even churches.
Chris Gull, owner of Prime Powersports in Shawano, showed off a high-end example of the side-by-side UTV, a Can-Am Defender Limited model with a 1000cc motor, six bucket seats in two rows, seat belts, heat, air and stereo sound. Although this model carries a $35,000 price tag, options can take the final price beyond $40,000.
Are these high-end models popular? There’s a six-month backorder for the Defenders, Gull noted.
Prime Powersports sells both Can-Am, his most popular line, and Polaris, a Wisconsin favorite. Polaris is currently working on a 1500cc model that will up the ante with luxury SxS seekers, but dealers can’t get them yet, he said.
About 25-30 counties in Wisconsin have opened up their county and city roads to both varieties of off-road vehicles, but it’s difficult to get comprehensive data because of the piecemeal records, according to Randy Harden, president of the Wisconsin ATV-UTV Association in Sheboygan. There are about 52,000 miles of legal roads and 6,800 miles of winter trails now open to these vehicles, he noted.
State laws allow towns and cities to open their roads to both by designating ATV routes. Shawano, Oconto and Waupaca counties have opened up most rural roads to ATVs and UTVs, while Outagamie and other counties have resisted, largely based on unfounded fears of reckless driving.
This trend of opening more paved roads to big-tire vehicles has created an entirely new type of riding called “overlanding,” Harden explained. This involves groups traveling four to six days or more by ATV or UTV and camping or staying in motels.
The payoff for county and city businesses is huge, with restaurants, bars, motels, convenience stores and related tourism stops garnering an estimated $1 billion a year, Harden said. Getting an exact figure is tough. The Wisconsin Department of Tourism did its last ATV impact study in 2003, when there were about 192,000 ATVs in the state.
A new survey of trail riders was launched this spring, with help from the ATV-UTV Association’s volunteer “trail ambassadors.” It’s expected to be completed in March 2024 for release at the Governor’s Conference on Tourism, Harden said. It’s likely to show a potential doubling of financial impact, since there are now nearly 500,000 registered ATVs and UTVs in the state.
The increase in paved-road access for off-roaders hasn’t necessarily increased sales of these vehicles, Gull said, but has increased the demand for nicer vehicles with more amenities.
“The industry was on fire before that,” he said, noting the popularity of trail riding for the past few decades. The pandemic did help boost sales as “people wanted to get into the great outdoors.”
The demand for larger and heavier UTVs with bigger tires (the Defenders wear 30-inch high-pressure radial tires similar to car tires while the new Polaris Ranger XD 1500 will wear 32-inch tires) could create new problems for those who want to use these machines on both paved roads and trails, Harden noted.
State law used to limit ATVs on trails to a 48-inch width, then bumped the law to 50 inches, Harden said. As side-by-side use grew, the law was changed to a 65-inch width in 2012. Low-pressure tires common on ATVs also were required, but that’s changed to allow the high-pressure tires found on most SxS vehicles. The low-pressure tires actually create louder noise on paved roads than the high-pressure ones, he said.
The legal weight limit for registered ATVs and UTVs, once at 2,000 pounds, is now 3,000 pounds in Wisconsin, Harden said. Today’s mega-UTVs, built for all states, are tipping the scales at 3,300 or more pounds, which could create a legal hiccup for these otherwise smooth-riding vehicles, he said.
Although Harden confirmed via his network of member dealers that UTVs are outselling ATVs at between eight and 12 to one, ATVs still far outnumber UTVs in the state.
The Wisconsin ATV-UTV Association has about 38,000 members and 130 clubs, including the Shawano-based Wisconsin Trail Lake Runners Inc., established in 2018. The state group’s website, which includes a variety of route maps, is www.watva.org. Both groups can be found on Facebook.
The Shawano club is one of many working on the initial efforts to construct a parallel Pulaski-to-Wausau Mountain-Bay Trail that would accommodate ATV and UTV riders, Gull said. He has pledged to donate land adjacent to his store to help this section of trail. The existing 83-mile trail allows hikers, bikers, horseback riders and more, but not motorized traffic.
Ross Bielema is a freelance writer from New London and owner of Wolf River Concealed Carry LLC. Readers can contact him at Ross@wolfriverccw.com.
Off-roaders go civilized as more roads open
