Most agencies are happy to give me trail data for My Trails. They recognize it is a public benifit for the public to be able to see where the trails are located on thier GPS. Even the National Park Service is normally happy to provide me data and they have lots of great data on the Internet.
A couple of years ago I attended a public meeting the NPS was having on the Ozark National Scenic Riverways. They told me they had GPSed their trails. So I emailed them telling them what Iwanted the data for and asking for it. After several months I got them to respond and they refused to give me the data.
So I filed a Freedom of Informaiton Act Request for the data. They told me it would take them 40 hours to find the data and I would have to pay about $1,400 for the trail files. I told them it should only take 15 minutes to get the data and the Forest Service has sent me data while I was still on the phone asking for it. I also asked for a public interest fee waiver. I gave them a link to My Trails and pointed out thousands have downloaded my maps.
In 2007 Congress amended FOIA to not allow them to charge search fees if they do not rule on the request within 20 days. After 20 days, I pointed out they can no longer change me search fees since they missed the deadline. They refused and I filed an appeal.
8 months latter they ruled on my appeal. First in spite of my link to this site, they basically claimed I was lying about making the maps and thousands of people downloading them and denied my fee wavier. They also ruled thier 2002 regulations trumped the 2007 Amendments to FOIA. In other words, they made the absurd argument that Congress cannot overturn thier requlations.
So a friend of mine filed a pro bono lawsuit. The judge ruled in my favor today. So the NPS has spent 10s of thousands of dollars to avoid letting citizens see on their GPS where the trails their tax dollars paid for are located!
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