Visitation to Great Smoky Mountains National Park boomed in October/NPS
Visitation to national parks this October had to be higher than 2013 numbers, if only because of last year's partial government shutdown that closed the parks. But this October saw a tremendous bounce at Great Smoky Mountains National Park, where visitation was the highest in nearly 30 years.
Park officials say 1,261,104 people visited Great Smoky last month, adding that October typically is the second busiest month of the year for the park as visitors come to see the park's fall foliage. This year, visitors continued to come to the park despite record rainfall at the beginning of the month, a strong wind event, and a major snow storm on the last day of the month, park official said. Before this October, that month's highest visitation came in 1987, when 1,576,500 visitors came to the park.
Although visitation through the park's major entrances at Gatlinburg, Townsend, and Cherokee was up, outlying areas led the way in making this month the fourth-highest October on record, park officials said. Visitation at the outlying areas of the park in October was 73 percent above the 20-year average. Outlying areas include places like Foothills Parkway, Cosby, Big Creek, Greenbrier, Deep Creek, Cataloochee, and Abrams Creek.
In light of a lawsuit pending against the park in a bid to overturn a $4 per night per person backcountry fee, notable among October's visitation numbers were those for backcountry use. October saw 10,294 backcountry users, which brought the yearly tally to 80,595. According to Park Service numbers, such high use hadn't been seen since October 2011, when 9,488 people headed into the backcountry and the year-to-date total was 81,815. Prior to that, one needed to go back to October 1999, when 11,414 backcountry users were counted, and the year-to-date tally stood at 85,041.
Visitation has been up nearly every month this year with over eight million people visiting the park so far. The highest annual visitation on record was set in 1999 when 10,283,598 people visited Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Through this October, visitation to Great Smoky stood at 8,849,976, according to Park Service data.
Comments
I was one of those people. It was crowded, but absolutely beautiful. And two miles down almost any path got you near total solitude.
The NPS is fudging numbers again. Last weekend, a beautiful Fall backpacking weekend, the majority of backcountry campsites were totally empty, according to the reservation website. I checked most all of the sites and stayed in one and walked by several more. The reason the NPS is lying is to offset the fact that in the first year of their backcountry fee they managed to drop visitation to the backcountry by %30. Understand these false figures are brought to you by the same Smokies administration that is responsible for allowing Blackberry Farms to cut trees and maintain private trails because of their association with a prominent Senator who started the resort. It is also the same administration that illegally rerouted a trail to give land to a former Tn Governor whose house abuts it. This is also the same Smokies administration who, when asked what the public sentiment was regarding the fee in the form of public comments, was caught red handed fudging numbers in their favor by attempting to discount an online movement that had over 500 signatures. Superintendent Dale Ditmanson said, "online petitions do not count as a comment" despite the fact they were included in the comments when someone did a FOIA. 8 million cars may drive through the Smokies per year. I promise there are no 8 or 9 million "visitors". It is another way they cry for more money. Numbers fudgers.
I have often wondered how the NPS could be so precise in terms of total number of visitors in the Smokies. Presumably the backcountry camping numbers are precise and based on those paying the onerous fee, but even here one has to wonder whether the numbers are individual campers, camper nights, or something else. As for the stated number of 1,261,104 overall October visitors, I must cry foul.
I grew up on the edge of the Park in Bryson City, and I have never seen any counting mechanism in place which can offer anything approaching the precision the NPS gives in this press release. There are no admission fees for the Park proper, no check-in area or gates on Highway 441 (the main road through the Park), and simply no way such precision can meet the mathematical smell test. Maybe someone can explain the process involved in reaching the numbers, but I am convinced there's no way such precison is possible.
Accordingly, when the NPS gives such specific numbers it raises questions about the overall accuracy of anything they offer.
Jim Casada
Note: Counting procedures changed in 2012 so any comparison to a year other than 2012 and 2013 would be invalid. That is, unless you use the IPCC methodology and just make up the prior numbers.
January 1, 2012
GREAT SMOKY MOUNTAINS NATIONAL PARK
PUBLIC USE COUNTING AND REPORTING INSTRUCTIONS
Following are detailed instructions for collecting and reporting data to be entered on Form 10-157, Revised, Monthly Public Use Report by Great Smoky Mountains National Park. These instructions are effective the date of issuance and will continue in effect unless changed by amendment or by memorandum from the Socio-
Economic Studies Division to the superintendent approving a requested change.
Each item below describes the procedures to be followed in collecting public use data and summarizing the various elements of those data for entry on the corresponding line on the 10-157, Monthly Public Use Report. Recreation Visitors
1. An inductive loop traffic counter (Station 401 Lane 2) is located across the southbound lane of Newfound Gap Road at the Gatlinburg entrance. The traffic count is reduced by the number of buses and Non-reportable vehicles (19 per day). The reduced traffic count is multiplied by the persons-pervehicle(PPV) multiplier in Table 1.
2. The number of bus passengers. This is the number of buses times the person per bus multiplier of 45.
3. An inductive loop traffic counter (Station 404 Lane 2) is located across the southbound lane of Tennessee 73 inside the park boundary at the Townsend entrance. The traffic count is reduced by the number of Non-reportable vehicles (10 per day). The reduced traffic count is multiplied by the PPV multiplier in Table 1.
4. Inductive loops traffic counters (Station 403 Lanes 3 and 4) are located across the northbound lanes of Newfound Gap Road south of the entrance to Oconaluftee Visitor Center at the Oconaluftee entrance. The traffic count is reduced by the number of Non-reportable vehicles (17 per day). The reduced traffic count is multiplied by the PPV multiplier in Table 1.
5. An inductive loop traffic counter is located at the Abrams Creek entrance. The traffic count is multiplied by the PPV multiplier in Table 1.
6. The traffic at Balsam Mountain spur road is estimated in Table 2. The traffic count is multiplied by the PPV multiplier in Table 1.
7. An inductive loop (FOTSC) traffic counter is located across the northbound entrance lane ofHeintooga-Round Bottom. The traffic count is multiplied by the PPV multiplier in Table 1.
Note: Table 1 shows a multiplier of 2.8 June- September and 2.5 the remainder of the year.
Additional park comments on counting can be found here:
https://irma.nps.gov/Stats/SSRSReports/Park%20Specific%20Reports/Monthly...
EC, can't seem to find the page with your "note" on it. Can you point us to it? (I realize the remark about IPCC was your own...)
Table 1 was in the same doc as the 7 point count description I posted. The table was simply two lines and two columns showing the month ranges and multipliers.
Also, I missed a line that says that total count is reduced by 12% to eliminate duplicate reporting.
Click "Visitor Use Counting Procedures " (one up from bottom) for full PDF.
https://irma.nps.gov/Stats/Reports/Park
Kurt, I tried to access that website but got a message that it was "unavailable". Much like when I go to the backcountry reservation website. It is often "unavailable".
Very good news for GSMNP.