San Francisco ? A federal judge Friday tossed out new Bush administration rules that gave national forest managers more discretion to approve logging and other commercial projects without lengthy environmental reviews.

U.S. District Court Judge Phyllis Hamilton ruled that the government failed to adequately consider the effects the rules would have on the environment and neglected to properly gather public comment on the issue.

Hamilton said in her written decision that the government couldn’t institute the new rules until proper environmental reviews were conducted, but she declined to specify how the nation’s 155 national forests should be managed until then.

U.S. Forest Service spokesman Joe Walsh said the government was reviewing the decision and noted it differs from rulings on similar cases in two other federal courts, including the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver.