SAN FRANCISCO (AP) – A federal judge on Wednesday reinstated the “Roadless Rule,” a Clinton-era ban on road construction in nearly a third of national forests.

U.S. District Judge Elizabeth Laporte ruled that the Bush administration failed to conduct necessary environmental studies before making changes that allowed states to decide how to manage individual national forests.

The 2001 rule prohibits logging, mining and other development on 58.5 million acres in 38 states and Puerto Rico, but the Bush administration replaced it in May 2005 with a process that required governors to petition the federal government to protect national forests in their states.

Laporte sided with 20 environmental groups and four states .

The states are California, New Mexico, Oregon and Washington – that sued the U.S. Forest Service over the changes.

“This is fantastic news for millions of Americans who have consistently told the Forest Service that they wanted these last wild areas of public land protected,” said Kristen Boyles, an attorney for Earthjustice, one of the plaintiffs.

Forest Service officials could not be immediately reached for comment.

Laporte’s ruling does not affect about 9.3 million acres of Alaska’s Tongass National Forest, which is covered by a separate rule on road construction and other development.

The decision comes a month after the U.S. Forest Service agreed to delay a plan to log inside a roadless area of the White Mountain National Forest.

The Forest Service initially had approved the Than Brook logging project, which would allow harvesting on 933 acres, including 473 acres in the Wild River Inventoried Roadless Area. The plan also includes building about 200 feet of logging road in the roadless area.

But after the Sierra Club and four other environmental organizations filed an administrative appeal, Forest Supervisor Tom Wagner issued a temporary delay. He rejected arguments that the area was covered by the Clinton area roadless rule, but said the project could affect the Ellis River’s future designation as a recreational river.

Because Wednesday’s ruling was in a different federal court circuit, it was not immediately clear what effect it would have on other areas of the country.