Entrance fees revenues across the National Park System dipped slight in 2010 compared to 2009, although National Park Service officials aren't sure what was behind the decline.
Fees from park specific passes, daily entrance fees, the various interagency fees, and commercial fees totaled $125,776,233 last year, down from $129,640,627 in 2009, according to figures tracked by Jane Moore, the Park Service's fee program manager in Washington, D.C. (Of the 394 units of the National Park System, just 139 collect entrance fees.)
Daily entrance fees showed the biggest drop, declining from $84.5 million in 2009 to $78.5 million last year. Whether the three fee-free weekends last year accounted for the lion's share of that decline is impossible to say, according to Ms. Moore.
"It's really hard to quantify revenue loss with fee free days. Yes, we know there are some losses, but the things that affect visitation are so variable: weather, gas prices, competing recreation and leisure activities, overall travel and trip expenses, park closures, etc.," she said. "Also, our revenue is reported monthly. We don't have a good way to monitor revenue by the day, so we do our best to compare monthly revenue reports/statistics to look at overall trends."
Fee Free Days and Visitation Trends
Visitation impacts and trends directly related to the fee free days are hard to quantify. Our limited review of the initial free weekends indicated some sites experienced an increase in visitation, others saw no effect and some even had small decreases in visitation depending on the weekend.
After talking with some of the parks after the last free days, our feeling is that parks that are near population centers are most likely to see visitation increases on the free days. However, other factors can have a significant impact. For example weather, even if there is a large population near the park, if the weather is bad it seems that people did not take advantage of the free day. Parks that are not near population centers, were less likely to see any increase on the free days. This is likely explained by the fact that the cost and effort to get to the park outweighed the incentive of the free days.
Beyond the direct impact of how many additional people visited a park during one of the free days there is likely many indirect impacts. Free days could indirectly play a role in increasing visitation throughout the year due to increased publicity for the NPS. The amount of exposure and media around the free fee day was clearly a tremendous benefit to the service. The extensive publicity in newspapers across the country, on the internet and from social media reminded the public of the magnificent heritage that the national park system preserves and that national parks offer an affordable vacation option even with a small entrance fee.
Further, the coverage using new social media may have introduced a new younger group to the parks. The increased publicity and good will generated by itself is a substantial benefit of the free days.
Comments
Personally I do not like the free days idea. On one hand it may encourage someone to visit a park that has never done so in the past or allow someone who cannot afford to. On the other hand it can make the crowds large and parking tougher. I would be mad if I had planned a vacation in advance and then had to deal with extra crowds. I would suggest find another way to distribute the free passes to people and let them choose when they want to go. As for me the entrance fee is not going to stop my trips.
II suspect that some of the reduction in entrance fees may have resulted from decreased use of personal motor vehicles in this recession, as well as the ever-mounting gasoline prices.
Park staff are necessary, and limited already in their capacity to preserve Park values. I hope we all recognize that no reduction in funding occurs. If any are proposed, I hope that all concerned will write or telephone in protest of any such action.
I comment in sincere hope that we can all recognize the need for what our Natinoal Parks, and other protected lands, bring to us, and to all our future.
I myself can only pass through the Parks by vehicle these past 4 years, due to the wolf/wolf hybrid that was abandoned, injured and diseased, who determined to bond to me, in spite of my not being a domestic animal fan. He is only partly definable as domestic, but I do recognize that some places I loved to visit: Yellowstone, Yosemite, Grand Teton, Redwood, Crater Lake, Sequoia/Kings Canyon, Joshua Tree and others I have visited and long to explore further, are out of bounds to us.
I hope we could all understand that we have to wait, or use less intrusive transportation, or even just know that these priceless places are there, and value them whether we can explore or not!
Free days are part of the inroad strategy necessary to help former nonusers of the wild and natural landscape to gain a sense of ownership/partnership in preserving their own health as well as the health of our land.
We see that most freeday users are near urban areas, and if more developed study could be undertaken of the demographic, further appreciatino and education could be targeted toward both these users, and to identified groups that don't see themselves as havng use for or appreciation for the very real values which the Parks serve.
I was particularly struck by this comment: "Parks that are not near population centers, were less likely to see any increase on the free days. This is likely explained by the fact that the cost and effort to get to the park outweighed the incentive of the free days." It strikes me that this is so-self-evident as to almost be non-controversial. Given how much it costs for most Americans to reach a Park like Yellowstone (especially) or even the Grand Canyon or Yosemite - $25 for a week's admission must hardly factor into the decision. For these Parks, at least, the fee free days are probably pure revenue loss, with surely little increased visitation.
Glacier NP had free admission when I was there in August, 2009. There seemed to be a slight uptick in visitors in the Many Glacier area, but it's hard to say if the free admission was the cause or the weekend with relatively good weather.
Yosemite, I assume was NOT in that list, right. We recently read where Yosemite's spokesperson seemed overjoyed when speaking of visitation at the Park of 4,000,000 in 2010, close to record numbers.
In '97 there was a flood that they NPS used to reduce campsites to unacceptable levels, without the use of a normal planning process. Since, the 9th district court of appeals has determined that those former plans were not legal. Thankfully, Yosemite National Park had to rescind those plans. This means that the current condition of those so called "flooded" campgrounds reverts back to "flood damaged" and there is no "Plan" to justify the NPS's continued lack of repair to those campgrounds. Yosemite National Park received close to 200,000,000 from congress, because Yosemite's Park Superintendent and the then western regional NPS director, Jon Jarvis, asked for the money. Some of that money was ear marked for flood repair of those campgrounds.
Sorry for the history lesson, I felt that there may be some that may not have that information.
Now, as there is no authority to leave the campgrounds flood damaged, and they have been given money to pay for the flood damage, perhaps it's time to use some of that money they have for its intended purpose. The current superintendent stated, at a Yosemite Conservancy meeting in Yosemite in October of '10, that they now have close to 400 of the original 800 or so campsites, and they have authority to have as many as 700, but that they need to wait until the new Merced River Plan is complete before they can do anything with the flooded campground real estate.
I take issue with this view. Because, they have been paid to repair them, they are simply "damaged", as their status has reverted from "removed" back to the former status of “flood damaged. Why do they need to wait for a new plan?
If the flood were to occur tomorrow, and congress gave them money that they asked for to repair them, would they have to wait to the future Merced River Plan to make the necessary repairs? I doubt that.
Back to the "poor me" NPS for having a "dip in entrance fee money". It was only a few years ago that the gate fees were raised considerably with "Fee Demo" money, which ensured at least a 30% increase in gate revenues to Yosemite, and other parks.
The money to repair the flooded campgrounds is in their wallet still, and the fee demo increase in gate fees was money that they didn't even have to say how they would use it. Now their poor accountants can't balance their spreadsheets if they don't continue to have more money than the year before. Poor NPS.
I forget that they manage such places like privately owned amusement parks anymore and it's all about the "experience", as they compete with the private sector for our recreation dollars.
Why is it that the NPS always feels that they need to heavily market these parks the way they do? They say they have free days to expose people who are less fortunate and might not otherwise have a nature experience of a National Park, yet how is 3,000 people a day hiking to Vernal Falls on any given weekend day in summer a “nature experience”. The truth is that they have highly skilled and highly paid marketing people working for them who see visitation to Yosemite as competition for money otherwise spent on things like cable television and all the other things you can think of that competes for what few measly entertainment dollars are left at the end of the weeks. In this time of economic downturn they want to see black ink? A free weekend to Yosemite is tantamount to free HBO weekends and the like, which is simply advertising 101.
I don’t buy the headlines put out by the NPS spin doctors, and I’m not very sympathetic.
Sorry. Correction, I said: "Thankfully, Yosemite National Park had to rescind those plans. This means that the current condition of those so called "flooded" campgrounds reverts back to "flood damaged" and there is no "Plan" to justify the NPS's continued lack of repair to those campgrounds. Yosemite National Park received close to 200,000,000 from congress, because Yosemite's Park Superintendent and the then western regional NPS director, Jon Jarvis, asked for the money. "
It was actually John Reynolds, former NPS Pacific Regional Director, who was the one who stated his unwillingness to reopen the YVP back in 2001 at Radanovich's Congressional Hearing. Jarvis was was not involved, nor at the Hearing.
Sorry, my bad.