JACKSON -- Despite a clear commitment from the Bush administration to allow snowmobiles to continue to enter Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks, conservation groups opposed to the idea plan to stay the course.

"Elections are important, but it doesn't change the facts on the ground," Chris Mehl of the Wilderness Society said last week. "Studies and facts show if you want a safe and healthy Yellowstone, you've got to have the transition (to snowcoaches)."

Mehl's group has been among the strongest fighters of the plan to allow continued snowmobile access to the park. His reasons for continuing the fight -- when the presidential election all but trumped his hand -- remain the same.

"Having a park where someone doesn't have to take their health in danger is not a useless cause," he said.

Mehl said his group has not decided how it will proceed.

But last week, as the ink dried on the National Park Service's interim plan to allow limited numbers and types of snowmobiles in Yellowstone during up to three years of study, several other conservation groups and a tourism group filed suit against the plan.

Ed Klim with the International Snowmobiles Manufacturers Association in Minnesota remains frustrated with the litigation.

"The only time the fringe groups of the environmental movement will be happy is when the park is closed to all vehicles," he said. "They not only want to close the parks to snowmobiles in the winter, but summer, too."

Mehl said the groups he works with support snowcoach access in winter, and funneling more money to gateway communities to help transition away from snowmobiles in the parks.

Still, Klim said snowmobilers have compromised by accepting reduced numbers and requirements on sleds.

"A compromise has been reached, but nothing is acceptable to them," he said.

Klim said his organization supports the interim plan and hopes it will be allowed to work.

Environmental reporter Whitney Royster can be reached at (307) 734-0260 or at royster@trib.com.