Changes in the National Park System

Just curious, has anyone changed their summer plans due to the new park management plan? Are you willing to pay the $75 entrance fee? Have you had any luck with the dayhike reservation system? I got skunked. And I had to change my time off due to the odd/even license plate policy.

What has your experience been?

?? Details please, or a reference...which parks, where

I wasn't aware that NPS had changed their policy. I just came back from a two-nighter in Saguaro National Park and the policies and permit prices (+$1.00) were much the same as they were in '09. I got a permit for the Grand Canyon for this coming May: same policy and price as the last time I got a permit in '09.

I don't know about the entrance fees; they could have changed and I wouldn't have been aware because I use the lifetime senior pass I got for $10.00 about 1999. Truly this was the best money I've ever spent.

Could this be something specific to one of the California parks. As I said, I've heard nothing and I'm usually aware of what is going on in the western National Parks.

Finally, entrance fees are a thing of the past for me. Got my Golden Age pass! Yipeee! Yes, some areas I avoid due to the difficult regulations. The SF Bay area is one. Fees for entry, fees for parking, fees for everything! State Parks are getting out of my range with price. Henry Coe raised rates. It depends, though. The fees for the shuttle to Devils Postpile were worth the cost for me last summer (this fee is not covered by Golden Age passes either). The Mammoth Lakes area has a wonderful free suttle service to augment the Devils Postpile bus fees so you can really get around easily.

I tend to agree with restricting Half Dome day-hikes. The amount of people on the cables was really not safe.

Here is a thorny question. Where there is really limited access in our national parks (such as Half Dome cables) should US citizens who pay taxes get priority over foreign tourists? Should there be a "foreign" quota? Same for Grand Canyon.

California state parks are really pricing themselves out of business! I haven't checked the camping fees this year, but last year they were only a couple dollars per night less than a room at the Motel 6. So much for trying to save money by car-camping when I go visit my daughter!

I too take full advantage of the federal Senior Pass (mine is a Golden Age Pass since I got it before they changed the names). It substitutes for the Northwest Forest Pass (required for almost all trailhead parking in Pacific NW national forests) and gets me into a lot of Federal places for half price.

The Washington legislature is coming up with a similar pass, but pricier, which will be required for WA state parks, state game lands and state DNR lands. The alternative, they say, is closing all of them. It seems they have plenty of money for other stuff (like thousands to refinish the governor's desk), though! I probably won't be buying one, which means I won't be hiking a number of places on the north side of the Columbia Gorge where the trailheads are on DNR land. The one state park I frequent in WA (at Westport, where my son #3 and his family have a vacation home) has city parking right outside the state park's parking lot, so there's no need for me to get a pass.

Oregon is managing to keep its state parks open with lottery funds. That seems to be the one source of state revenue that isn't drying up.

I don't do much with national parks except drive through, since they won't allow my dog Hysson on the trails. Kennel fees are going through the roof. Hysson whines all the time when he's in the kennel or with my DIL, and I don't think having him under stress for a week is a good idea.

Look at the date of Trailrunners's post. I think we have been had.....

I do not think we have been had. The "raise the fee" thing is an ongoing topic. The "restrict access" is also an ongoing thing. Regardless if the original post was 1970, 2002 or yesterday, it is only getting worse.

I just checked Pt. Reyes, no charge to visit, just the camping fee. Had me worried Nancy.

What gripes me about camping fees, is that it is the same price for one person or six. Yosemite has Camp4 - a walk in per-person fee campsite. I do not see why there cannot be more of these around. Same with backcountry permits in Sequoia-same price for one person or 15! Another thing, I have seen lots of RV's parked at pull outs on Hwy 1, evidently camping overnight. Yet it is illegal for me to pull over in my car and "camp".

Thank makes no sense to me wandering daisy....strange!

April Fools or what? Have we been had?!

Yes, last sentence is pretty fishy!

All of the new regulations are explained in NPS directive 04012011.

Even the one about bringing the new series of bear canisters with steel reinforcements?

look at the directive number you have all been had. The license plate thing has been used for other things, and the fee things has been discussed, so it sounds real enough, but its a fake. Have a nice night everyone.

Wahoo!!! LOL!

ow wow - its the National Parks and Federal Recreational Lands Pass– Senior Pass and I can get one!!!!!!
Jim

almost as good as the new army head gear

Offical army head gear

Oops I forgot that there really is a dayhike reservation system in Yosemite on Half Dome.

Maybe I was kidding about a few things, but we really have to do something about those oil wells on Mt. Whitney........

And everyone knows that Robert Duvall made that Army Stetson famous in Apocalypse Now.

I really wouldn't mind the gov raising fee's or taxes if they would just spend it wisely, which they don't. As said before, they are pricing themselves out of business. Maybe it's there sick way of trying to prove that nature is more profitable if exploited instead of left alone. ???Oil well on Whitney???




The fee's in Yosemite look the same, for now..

Trailrunner:

I got a good laugh out of it. Thanks for carrying the torch.