WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Clinton administration should delay by four months an effort to ban roads in more than 50 million acres of federal forests so the public has more time to comment on the plan, 33 senators said Wednesday.

A 60-day comment period that began in late October is not enough time to collect and review data and study the initiative, said the letter to Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman signed by 32 GOP senators and Sen. John Breaux, D-La.

"This additional time would provide a critical window for the American people to assess the proposal and convey their thoughts," the senators said.

Glickman received the letter Wednesday but has not made a decision on the request, a spokeswoman said.

In October, President Clinton signed an executive order calling for regulations to put the already roadless forest land off-limits to development.

An administrative rule-making process to carry out the order began in late October and will take about a year to complete. The initial 60-day comment period is scheduled to end Dec. 20. Four public hearings remain: Portland, Ore., and Atlanta on Tuesday; Sacramento, Calif., on Wednesday and Washington, D.C. on Dec. 9.

A White House official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said there will be ample opportunity for the public to comment on the forest initiative.

Ken Rait, director of the Heritage Forests Campaign, said the senators' letter is a thinly veiled effort to kill Clinton's plan. He said a four-month delay in the initial comment period would not allow Clinton to complete the plan before he leaves office in January 2001, leaving the possibility that a GOP would win the presidency and scuttle it.

But Mark Rey, a staffer for the Senate Environment and Natural Resources Committee, said it's simply difficult for people to find time to comment during the holidays.