![]() ![]() The Logan Pass Visitor Center dates back to the Mission 66 era. At Glacier national park in Montana (annual visitation: 3.3 million), parking lots, too, have seen tense standoffs. Traffic woes aren’t confined to park roads. And while visitation has swelled, staffing, because of budget limitations, has remained the same.Ī crowded boardwalk in the Lower Geyser Basin in Yellowstone. There’s been a 90% increase in vehicle accidents, a 60% bump in calls for ambulance services and a 130% rise in searches and rescues, according to the park. “We’re exceeding the carrying capacity and because of it damage is being caused to park resources,” he says. ![]() Meanwhile, a video of a man taunting a bison went viral, and citations have been issued to troublemakers who illegally flew drones and tossed rocks and debris into Yellowstone’s sensitive geothermal features, which risks destroying them forever. This summer has seen a handful of visitors gored or kicked by bison and elk when they ventured too close. ![]() Sometimes travelers get more of a souvenir than they bargained for. People poured out, leaving their cars parked cattywampus, blocking traffic in both directions. In the Lamar Valley, a pack of wolves just visible in the distance drew a swarm of vehicles into a turnout. Photograph: NPS/Jacob W Frankīut the bison weren’t the only drama. “Most visitors just don’t know how to behave in a wild place.”Ī Bison jam near Madison Junction in Yellowstone. “My job is to manage people, not animals, and I try not to get upset,” said one in uniform. Impatient motorists tooted their horns as park rangers tried to bring order. Some tourists temporarily abandoned their vehicles in the hope of getting close enough for a photo. Bison passed within inches, even brushing up against the cars. Travelers excitedly scrambled from their vehicles. As the herd moved steadily across the road, a scene of frantic commotion began to unfold. On a recent August day in Hayden Valley, a “bison jam” stretched nearly two miles long. ![]() But this rewilding has meant animal sightings routinely cause gridlock along its two-lane roads. Famed for its grizzly bears, gray wolves and bison herds, the park is arguably “wilder” than it was 50 years ago, thanks to conservation work. In Yellowstone, epic bottlenecks are frequent. In Yosemite, despite a shuttle system, the park warns summer visitors to expect two- to three-hour delays entering Yosemite Valley. Traffic congestion has become one of the most visible consequences of overcrowding and underfunding, with some locations seeing tens of thousands of cars a day during peak months. Ryan Zinke’s attempt to sharply increase entry fees at the busiest parks to pay for repairs proved so unpopular it had to be walked back in April. The current backlog of necessary upgrades to roads, trails and buildings stands at more than $11bn. Much of the National Park Service’s infrastructure dates back to the Mission 66, a $1bn initiative undertaken in the 1950s and 60s, and wasn’t built with modern crowds in mind.Įnvironmental challenges are burgeoning – recent research has found national parks bear the disproportionate brunt of global warming – and years of wear and tear have seen park maintenance fall woefully behind. By the mid-century that number swelled to tens of millions, as more parks were added to the system and destination road trips became synonymous with American vacations.īut today the pace of visitation has outstripped resources. In 1904, the first year for which visitation figures are available, 120,690 people visited the national parks, which by then included Mt Rainier, Sequoia and Yosemite. In 1872, Yellowstone became the first national park in the world. Photograph: NPS/Neal Herbert People, people everywhere Moreover, we found people wrestling with an existential question: what should a national park be in the modern age? Can parks embrace an unlimited number of visitors while retaining what made them, as the writer Wallace Stegner once put it, “ the best idea we ever had”?Ĭrowds at Old Faithful in Yellowstone. We found a brewing crisis: two mile-long “bison jams” in Yellowstone, fist-fights in parking lots at Glacier, a small Colorado town overrun by millions of visitors. Over a period of four months, from high summer to late autumn, the Guardian dispatched writers across the American west to examine how overcrowding is playing out at ground level. “Our own species is having the greatest impact on the park and the quality of the experience is becoming a casualty.” In Yellowstone, America’s oldest national park, visitation has surged 40% since 2008, topping 4 million in 2017.Īfter 43 years in the park service, Wenk is worried. “The least-studied mammal in Yellowstone is the most abundant: humans,” says Dan Wenk, the former superintendent of one the most chronically overcrowded parks in the system. ![]()
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