Utah's congressional delegation opposes a reservation system for visitors at Zion National Park/NPS
U.S. Sens. Mitt Romney and Mike Lee and the rest of Utah's congressional delegation told Interior Secretary David Bernhardt they don't want to see a reservation system established at Zion National Park because it could adversely impact the local economy.
Overcrowding at Zion has been an issue for many years, placing a stress not only on park staff but also park resources. In an effort to seek a solution to managing the crowds, park staff for some years has been exploring various approaches to managing visitation. Some of those approaches have touched on either a park-wide reservation system or reservations for specific areas in the park, such as Angels Landing or the Temple of Sinawava.
Problems with crowding have included the creation of roughly 30 miles of "social trails" in Zion Canyon, where there are only 13 miles of official foot paths, and challenges to keep restrooms clean.
The congressional delegation, though, hopes the Park Service can find ways other than reservations to manage crowds and protect the park's resources.
"If the (Zion National Park) Capacity Study concluded that a reservation system is nececessary to meet new capacity standards were necessary and recommended a reservation system to implement the standards, it would likely result in reduced visitation and negative economic impacts," the senators and congressmen wrote.
"We strongly urge the Department (of Interior) to find solutions that will preserve access to ZNP while enhancing the visitor experience," they added. "State and local leaders have proposed several solutions including improved public outreach and use of the state's marketing resources, state and local investment in trails or road infrastructure alternatives outside of Zion Canyon, and shuttle system changes to manage peak visitation."
Interior and Park Service officials, they concluded, should explore the ideas suggested by stakeholders "to improve the visitor experience without severely restricting visitors from accessing ZNP. We urge the Department to carefully evaluate these proposals rather than pursuing burdensome visitor limitations and reservation systems."
Comments
Perhaps our fine Legislators from the Great State of Utah would then be willing to have their State coffers supplement the financial shortcomings we now face even more under this Administration, to assist in alleviating the financial burder thair argumants demand. Or is their "solution" to simply let America run untethered throughout what will then become yet another destroyed part of History?
That's right - if we simply ignore the ongoing issues, they WILL most certainly fad away....
They are simply using up the National Park units in their state, with no concern for future generations or the preservation of our "NATIONAL" heritage!
Nothing but GREEED runs through their veins!
Ranger - Could you explain how the legislators personally benefit by opposing a reservation system?
Buck, a reservation system would preserve and protect the park by capping the number of visitors in the park at any one time. This would protect the park by reducing severe spikes in visitor impacts and spreading those impacts over a longer timespan, essentially allowing the park environment to heal a bit. A reservation system would similarly cap spikes in the workload of overloaded park personnel, particularly the LEOs, to a level closer to what they can handle given limited manpower and budget.
The greed part comes in because capping the number of visitors in the park at any one time would also similarly cap the money being spent by those visitors both within the park and with local businesses. Park concessionaires and local businesses don't like that; they are greedy for all the revenues they can get and thus want all the visitors that can be packed into the park and its local environs all the time.
Politicians whose constituencies include park concessionaires and local businesses personally benefit from opposing reservation systems because their opposition to those systems pleases park concessionaires and local businesses who then support them through influence or contributions in subsequent election cycles.
What I want to know is why you need an explanation of these factors and relationships. I mean you are always, always, always offering emphatic assertions and strong opinions about park management and economics in general; yet, you have to ask about such elementary fundamentals of how the parks and the associated businesses operate? I would have assumed that you'd already be something of an expert in this regard given your constant imperious comments on these kinds of topics.
How would reservations be handled? How do we ensure they are not monetized (for ex., some people paying to get other's reservations)? Will slots go to Americans first since we pay for the parks? Would there be a provision for some set asides for locals? Would there be a cap on preferred hikes (for ex., 1 or 2 hikes on Angel'sLanding in a calendar yea)? Would it coordinate with lodge reservations? This is a complicated issue. New park units or proposed ones like the one in backcountry Maine are often sold on the basis that parks will pay for themselves via tourist dollars in place of industries replaced by the parks. Here's a park that does pay for itself and that's a problem too.
Rump - once again with the baseless accusations. First, campaign contributions go to the campaign, not to the pockets of the candidate. Second here are the contributors for Lee and Romney.
https://www.opensecrets.org/members-of-congress/contributors?cid=N000316...
https://www.opensecrets.org/races/contributors?cycle=2018&id=UTS1&spec=N
Xanterra, the prime concesssionaire in Zion, doesn't show up in the top twenty of contributors for either Lee or Romney, The numbers are getting pretty small when you get down to #20 so if there were any contribution it would hardly meet the standard of "greed".
Come on, Buck; it sure seems you're bent on being either disingenuous or just outright dense. Campaign contributions may technically go to the campaign; but, they are most certainly a benefit (yes, a personal benefit) to the candidate. Why stoop to trying to confuse the public on something that obvious? And, you have to know that neither a park concessionaire nor a politician with that park concessionaire in his/her constituency is going to want a direct contribution standing out and attracting attention. Local businesses might be that direct; but, larger park concessionaires and their management are going to use indirect support, by contributing to the party in ways that benefit the politician's campaign, by contributing as individuals, by influencing others to contribute, by influencing or contributing to an industry group or other form of PAC, or even by providing contrived job positions to party operatives who take home high salaries for doing party work on company time. Come on, Buck; you've got to know all of this. Just voice honest arguments for a change and stop trying to confuse the issues and corrupt the discussions.
Rump, once again you distort the facts. The links I provided include contributions of companies, PACs and individuals If an employee of Xanterra contributed, it would show up under Xanterra. Furthermore, are we to believe that Microsoft, Halliburton, Sullivan and Cromwell, the AZ Diamondbacks are so foolish to be exposed while NPA concessionaires stealthily skirt the system so they can remain undetected? The fact is, you don't have a bit of evidence that Xanterra has funneled a penny to these candidates, much less made them wealthy nor that these candidates have based their positions on this issue due to such influence. It just more of your baseless conspiracy theory accusations. A much more rational explaination would be that the inputs from the constitutents (the voters) has indicated they are against a reservation system.