Cost to Enter National Parks Will More Than Double, As Land Around Them Gets Leased for Oil and Gas
The current Republican president and his Secretary of the Interior have a different view of things. They are cutting the budget of the National Park Service and significantly increasing the fees to get in.
"The infrastructure of our national parks is aging and in need of renovation and restoration," said U.S. Secretary of the Interior Ryan Zinke. "Targeted fee increases at some of our most-visited parks will help ensure that they are protected and preserved in perpetuity and that visitors enjoy a world-class experience that mirrors the amazing destinations they are visiting."
But then according to AP,
"While the national parks counted 292 million visitors in 2014, those visitors tend to be older and whiter than the U.S. population overall." Sounds like people who voted for the president, and if you are over 62 it's free (albeit with a lifetime pass that just increased in price) so the boomer base is protected.But wait, there's more; in accordance with the President's executive order "promoting energy independence and economic growth, "they have started leasing land around National Parks (they are not allowed to in the parks) to today's Robber Barons for oil and gas development.
Oh well. National Monuments are better anyway.
U.S. National Park Service Seeks Comments on Proposed Fee Increases
The National Park Service issued a press release about its proposal to raise fees at its most popular parks:
News Release Date: October 24, 2017
Contact:NPS Office of Communications, 202-208-6843
Public invited to provide comments on proposed peak season fee increases at 17 highly visited parks
[...] The proposed new fee structure would be implemented at Arches, Bryce Canyon, Canyonlands, Denali, Glacier, Grand Canyon, Grand Teton, Olympic, Sequoia & Kings Canyon, Yellowstone, Yosemite, and Zion National Parks with peak season starting on May 1, 2018; in Acadia, Mount Rainier, Rocky Mountain, and Shenandoah National Parks with peak season starting on June 1, 2018; and in Joshua Tree National Park as soon as practicable in 2018.
A public comment period on the peak-season entrance fee proposal will be open from October 24, 2017 to November 23, 2017, on the NPS Planning, Environment and Public Comment (PEPC) website https://parkplanning.nps.gov/proposedpeakseasonfeerates. Written comments can be sent to 1849 C Street, NW, Mail Stop: 2346 Washington, DC 20240.
If implemented, estimates suggest that the peak-season price structure could increase national park revenue by $70 million per year. That is a 34 percent increase over the $200 million collected in Fiscal Year 2016. Under the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act, 80% of an entrance fee remains in the park where it is collected. The other 20% is spent on projects in other national parks.
During the peak season at each park, the entrance fee would be $70 per private, non-commercial vehicle, $50 per motorcycle, and $30 per person on bike or foot. A park-specific annual pass for any of the 17 parks would be available for $75.
The New York Post called some of the proposed increases "steep":
The National Park Service is considering a steep increase in entrance fees at 17 of its most popular parks, mostly in the West, to address a backlog of maintenance and infrastructure projects.
Visitors to the Grand Canyon, Yosemite, Yellowstone, Zion and other national parks would be charged $70 per vehicle, up from the fee of $30 for a weekly pass. At others, the hike is nearly triple, from $25 to $70.
Related Stories
Joshua Tree national park 'may take 300 years to recover' from shutdown
The former superintendent of Joshua Tree national park has said it could take hundreds of years to recover from damage caused by visitors during the longest-ever government shutdown.
"What's happened to our park in the last 34 days is irreparable for the next 200 to 300 years," Curt Sauer said at a rally over the weekend, according to a report from the Desert Sun. Sauer retired in 2010 after running the park for seven years.
The park reopened Monday after the record 35-day shutdown, and park workers returned to a state of chaos, including damaged trees, graffiti and ruined trails. The reduced ranger supervision during the shutdown saw increased vandalism at the park, causing officials to announce on 8 January that Joshua Tree would temporarily close. It was announced a day later that officials were able to use recreation fee revenue to avoid the closure.
"While the vast majority of those who visit Joshua Tree do so in a responsible manner, there have been incidents of new roads being created by motorists and the destruction of Joshua trees in recent days that have precipitated the closure," said park spokesman George Land in the news release.
Related: Cost to Enter National Parks Will More Than Double
(Score: 5, Interesting) by bradley13 on Monday October 30 2017, @10:47AM (8 children)
There's a blogger whose company runs campsites and other facilities [coyoteblog.com] throughout the country, including facilities in the national parks.
Consider this: His company cannot charge more than the parks would charge. He makes money, despite the fact that his company is responsible for maintenance *and* has to pay a share of the fees on to the park service. Yet the park services cannot afford to maintain these sites themselves.
Some of his articles look into the reasons. The main difference is this: For his nationwide company, he had an administrative staff of...one. Himself. In a typical park service, whether state or federal, you have an entire cadre of bureaucrats overseeing the few people actually on the ground doing things.
It's a disease of government: Bureaucracies exist to perpetuate themselves. There is almost never any reason to trim deadwood. If a private company becomes inefficient, and fails to correct this, it ultimately dies. The government just raises fees, or goes deeper into debt.
Dunno what the solution is. But raising fees is certainly not part of it - that will just finance more bureaucrats to schedule meetings to discuss the problem. And probably to hire private companies to do the actual work, while keeping the bureaucrats.
Everyone is somebody else's weirdo.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by crafoo on Monday October 30 2017, @02:09PM
I agree with you on all counts. However, please consider, this disease you identified is not limited to our public government. Large corporations also very much suffer from the exact same disease. And no, I do not believe they ultimately die or fail from this disease. All large corporations suffer from it. One would think a competitor would come along and would compete by being more efficient but they do not. As soon as they become large they implement the exact same power structure and organization. Out-source everything. Hire 15 managers to make decisions for 15 people (or worse). Complain endlessly that they cannot hire good staff (while paying 15% under market, cutting benefits, and treating them like shit).
Replacing the US Parks Service with a corporation would not solve anything. It would be a worse solution.
We need to address the root systemic problem. I don't know what makes people want to organize like this. I suspect it's because the psychotic nihilists get control.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Grishnakh on Monday October 30 2017, @02:38PM (4 children)
In a typical park service, whether state or federal, you have an entire cadre of bureaucrats overseeing the few people actually on the ground doing things.
It's a disease of government:
It's not just government; large corporations are all exactly like this. And what's funny is the people overseeing and not doing any work think they should get paid more than the people actually doing the work. And it's not just inside the corporations either: in the engineering sector, there seem to be more third-party recruiters out there looking for engineers than there are actual engineers to be hired. In fact, many engineering recruiters are former engineers themselves.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by frojack on Monday October 30 2017, @03:11PM (3 children)
You and the gp are both wrong.
While there is certainly payroll padding in private corporations, there are also large scale layoffs routinely and these are widely reported, loudly bemoaned, and the corporations involved loudly vilified (probably you participate in the latter).
And when that happens it often takes large segments of upper and middle management with it. But its routine, and expected. Why: Because corporations sooner or later have to make money, cover costs, produce something, sell something that people will buy. If governments could pad their bottom line by just holding a board meeting and decreeing that you the citizen owed them more money it would be different, and they could keep all the long since unproductive divisions producing buggy whips that nobody buys for decades.
Search Google news for the single word "layoff" just to refresh your memory. Check the leftist [huffingtonpost.com] press for all the whinging and gnashing of teeth each time it happens.
How two bitter posters can, in adjacent posts, assert that layoffs never happen in private corporations is beyond me.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @03:35PM
I think you'll find you are all correct. Layoffs do happen in the private sector, much more often than in public sector.
But with all the bickering about pricing and quality I hear about the US telco's it's very clear they do not have to fear any kind of fair competition. Next to this, when a new competitor does come around, the bigger companies can usually squash them by undercutting their prices in the relevant regions, putting up political roadblocks, suing, or just buying them out. Once a corporation gets large enough, it can drag a horde of bureaucrats along for a very long time without any big problems.
The source of the problem has been identified in gp post though. For some reason, the people not doing the actual work think they should earn more; and if they can direct more people they think they are more powerful or better than their peers. Remove/reverse those incentives and it'll be very different. (It may go bad in a different direction, but I can't imagine it yet)
(Score: 3, Informative) by Phoenix666 on Monday October 30 2017, @05:57PM
That's what classic economic and business theory would predict, but it largely doesn't happen that way. It's very easy to corrupt government to create the market distortions you need to make sure that doesn't happen.
In the meantime, who cares? As long as the upper management can lay-off the workforce or loot the company pension fund long enough to get themselves a fat payday, what does it matter what happens to any of the employees or customers?
The only situation in which a company can't exploit one of those tactics is really only one like you cited, the buggy whip manufacturer. The market has to so completely evaporate thanks to large, long term changes, that the gaps can't be papered over any more. But the timeline of such a market collapse is usually longer than living memory can recall.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 2) by jelizondo on Tuesday October 31 2017, @12:53AM
Search 'too big to fail' and come back and tell me why taxpayers should give money to so-well-run private enterprises.
As additional homework, seach for 'Jack Welch' and the current status of GE; after years of implementing firing 10% of the workforce, they are running around selling parts of a once proud American company.
Lack of efficiency, bureaucracy and ideology are human traits. You don't stop being human because you run a government agency or a private company, one is still prone to all human failures.
(Score: 3, Informative) by jelizondo on Monday October 30 2017, @02:57PM
In case you haven't, read Parkinson's Law [economist.com], it clearly explains that all organizations tend to grow larger because of stimuli inherent to the way humans organize; mind you, not only government bodies.
Very interesting and humorous, but deadly right.
(Score: 3, Informative) by NewNic on Monday October 30 2017, @06:41PM
I would be willing to bet that he does not offer anything comparable to the lifetime pass that the National Parks almost give away to over-62 year old people. So, in come circumstances, he does charge more than the national parks.
He probably doesn't provide the same level of educational resources, museums and stewardship of the land and wildlife that are found in National Parks, so his costs are lower.
And to cap it all, he is a climate change denier, so I would not give any credibility to anything he writes.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @02:01PM (4 children)
What the fuck does that even mean? How are you whiter than a general population? Did you not tan at all over the last 10 years, making you whiter than a person who tanned last summer?
Oh wait I get it, this is the usual tactic by the left to drum up some sort of a non-existent controversy using racial undertones. Oh no, only White people can afford a $200K RV-Bus, so CAMPING is WACIST! Seriously, these people have only one lens with whitch to view the world, and I would be sad for them if it wasn't so fucking offensive to me. Despicable nonsense, that should be called out, and shamed every time it is encountered.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @04:29PM (1 child)
yes, it's a way to make something automatically evil. these propagandists have to be dealt with. so far they have operated in safety. that free reign needs to end.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @05:17PM
Lololol
You wacko, it isn't about making anything evil, it IS about the irony of Trump's supporters (old and white generally) being the ones this will impact most.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @04:39PM (1 child)
Yes, there's many reasons, some not pleasant, that European ancestry is correlated with wealth and that African ancestry is inversely correlated with the same. However, race is not the reason we can do anything about at this scale (the scale of statistical sampling). Wealth disparity is something we can choose to do something about. Or at least addressing wealth disparity is a problem that we can solve with orders of magnitude more ease. And, in fact, solving wealth disparity will even work towards solving the more scurrilous racial baggage in the USA.
So we can make it an issue about race, which will just piss everybody off. People of African ancestry have many legitimate grievances. People of European ancestry, however, are just barely making ends meet themselves. Whites need to learn that even though their skin may be the same color as many MotUs, they should treat the MotUs as though their skin were green and scaly like the lizards they are.
The reason white people bristle at the idea that they're somehow responsible for the travails of the average black person is that they are not doing so well themselves! When can we admit that white working class people are a fundamentally different demographic than the MotU and that black working class people are a fundamentally similar demographic to white working class people?
I get closer to needing to turn in my Libertarian Party membership card. Getting more liberal the older I get it seems. It's completely obvious that the MotU are using race as a wedge issue to divide the working class against itself. With the working class divided against itself, blacks blaming whites and whites blaming blacks, they cannot effectively engage in collective bargaining. Both blacks and whites are being played by the sociopathic MotU, just because they don't want all of us to get together and decide that we need higher wages, more vacation time, and we need taxes on the very wealthy to be a lot higher than they currently are.
We should strive for a country where it doesn't matter where one's ancestors were living 500 years ago. Everybody should be able to go camping several times per year. We want to lift everybody, regardless of the color of their skin, up to this level. Instead, the MotU are dividing everybody to sink us back down to the level of medieval serfs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @05:20PM
Why do you think it is OK to stick your fingers into other people's pockets? Taking MY money to pay for THEIR lack of planning and responsibility! You're just jealous.
Well, that is what I imagine TMB would reply with.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @02:30PM (10 children)
Yosemite has a road that goes over the mountains. It's the only road in the area, especially if you look to the south. You could have to go hundreds of miles to avoid that road.
That is going to be effectively a $70 toll road.
And yes, I've paid the toll, twice.
I didn't even enjoy the park. It's kind of lame unless you are into really serious rock climbing or hang gliding. If you're passing through with a car full of kids, there is pretty much nothing of interest. Lassen at least has boiling mud.
(Score: 4, Touché) by Grishnakh on Monday October 30 2017, @02:45PM (4 children)
Maybe, but I'm willing to bet that the large majority of people passing through the park like you discuss are Trump voters, so I have zero sympathy. In fact, I think they should jack up the fare for people who drive straight through and don't bother to stop for at least 2 hours inside the park.
It's actually starting to get pretty funny watching Trump's idiot voters getting screwed over by his policies; it's only sad when they also affect other people.
(Score: 1) by Sulla on Monday October 30 2017, @04:23PM (3 children)
In general I presume his supporters are okay with this kind of thing because it puts the burden of upkeep on those who use the service rather than by taxing those who may use the service. From what the summary said it isn't like they are using the revenue to give tax breaks to the oil companies that surround the parks.
Really enjoy that when Trump does something that should actually help liberals (keep the parks they tend to enjoy more in good repair) they bitch and moan that he is only doing it because literally Hitler. Trump's base will continue to support him because the media pushes shitty narratives where Trump is literally the devil so they just assume the media is lying. Hell, if even 20% of what the media reported on Trump was unbiased in either direction the right would probably like Trump less, but the media just can't do that because they hate him so much.
So list of accomplishments.
TTP = Dead
Support for Syrian Rebels = Gone
Isis in Iraq = 50% contained from the time he took office
North Korea = Still not at war
Iran = Still not at war
Kurdistan = Revolted but civil war avoided and Kurd participation in Iraqi parliament possible
Growth = Greater than 2% (media and experts said this was impossible and not to trust liar Trump, but don't worry because he is still a liar because he said he could probably get 4)
He has done some bad as well, but so far doing better than Clinton. Better than second term Bush, although I suspect he would have failed worse than anyone else at 9/11.
Ceterum censeo Sinae esse delendam
(Score: 2) by Grishnakh on Monday October 30 2017, @04:43PM (2 children)
Really enjoy that when Trump does something that should actually help liberals (keep the parks they tend to enjoy more in good repair) they bitch and moan that he is only doing it because literally Hitler.
No one sane is saying Trump is "literally Hitler" because of raising the National Park fees. Perhaps for other reasons, but not that one; that's just dumb. This is just a typical Republican move of reducing/removing government benefits for the public, it's nothing unique to Trump.
It's not going to keep the parks in good repair. You're assuming that the visitor-ship will remain the same, which is obviously wrong. The higher fees will cause many people to avoid going, so the actual amount of revenue they get may even be lower (it's impossible to predict at this time).
As for me "bitching and moaning", $70 isn't that big a deal for me. I make plenty of money, unlike most Trump voters. The upper-middle-class liberals aren't being hurt much by Trump's policies (mainly the environmental ones, which hurt us all), it's the working-class Trump voters who are getting hurt, but they voted for it, so we're not particularly sympathetic. We tried to warn you, but you wouldn't listen.
He has done some bad as well, but so far doing better than Clinton.
Where did you get that crazy idea? For one thing, it's pretty hard to compare the performance of a President who's been in office for less than a year, in the year 2017, to a President who was in office for 8 years way back in the 1990s. But secondly, the Clinton years were probably the very peak for American society in most ways, and certainly economically. It's been downhill ever since. Of course, you can't give Bill all the credit for that, just like you can't give any President all the credit or blame for the economy during their watch (much of it is out of their control, and much is under the control of Congress, not the pres, and also much of the time the effects of the previous Pres's actions aren't fully realized until the next Pres's term), but I think it's pretty undeniable that overall, the American economy was better in the late 1990s than today. (And again, I don't believe this is Clinton's fault, he was just at the right place at the right time and didn't screw it up too badly. The credit goes not to the politicians, but to the people who created the Internet and then commercialized it. I guess you could give Al Gore a little credit for his work in the 70s in funding it, but the lion's share goes to those who actually built it, and created the services which made it irresistable to the general public.)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @07:55PM (1 child)
I believe you're thinking of the wrong Clinton...
(Score: 2) by MostCynical on Monday October 30 2017, @08:37PM
So Trump, the elected President, is a better President than someone who isn't President?
Or, your crystal ball shows how bad a President a person *would have been*? Does your cruystal ball also gove out lottery numbers, or just back up your prejudices?
"I guess once you start doubting, there's no end to it." -Batou, Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @04:06PM
It looks like you only value nature insofar as to its ability to entertain. You're a dope, and your children are dopes.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Phoenix666 on Monday October 30 2017, @04:36PM
So basically you're an anti-yosemite?
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Phoenix666 on Monday October 30 2017, @05:29PM (1 child)
That road is where I'd recommend visitors go if they want to enjoy the park's spectacular scenery and interesting geology. The valley is a morass of wall-to-wall traffic, coastal Californians, and hapless foreign tourists. The aggravation totally detracts from the sights.
The pass has far fewer people, but peaks that are as amazing, or more, than El Capitan or Half Dome. The interesting calving of the granite domes that characterise the park is more accessible from the roadside, too. You can pull over, walk right out, and examine it.
If you make it all the way to the other side of the divide, there's Mono Lake right there as well, which is worth a stop. East of the Sierras is so beautiful, quiet, and pleasant, and the people there so kind and unassuming, that you can forget you're in California at all.
Washington DC delenda est.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @06:08PM
I fly into a Bay Area, visit family, head east through stuff like Lassen or Chico (more family), and cross the mountains via US 4 or the interstate north of that. I might go around Tahoe on one side or the other. I then head south, enjoying the eastern side of the mountains, and then stop to visit Mono Lake.
Now, how should I get back to the airport? I have to go northwest. Yosemite is the only reasonable path.
BTW, on one of those trips I got advice from a ranger station that I should hike up one of the granite domes. (seeking something, anything, for that entrance fee) We'd just done Brokeoff Mountain in Lassen, so steepness and endurance wasn't an issue. I felt plenty safe up on Brokeoff Mountain standing on a rugged trail next to a cliff. It's different on a granite dome. It's steep and featureless. If you slip, you'll roll and slide for hundreds of feet. Screw that.
Mono Lake was great. I enjoyed my time on the eastern side of the mountains, including the drive up to the park. Once I entered the park, it was all downhill from there.
(Score: 2) by NewNic on Monday October 30 2017, @06:35PM
If all you did in Yosemite was drive that road, then you missed all the great views that the park has to offer.
lib·er·tar·i·an·ism ˌlibərˈterēənizəm/ noun: Magical thinking that useful idiots mistake for serious political theory
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @04:34PM (1 child)
these parks are just elite land grabs. just like world heritage sites and other NWO land grabs. one day they will have robots killing/eating anyone who tries to enter them when escaping from the nearest megacity/prison colony.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @04:57PM
That's why we should make certain that these parks remain accessible to every person in the USA, perhaps the entire world for sites like Yosemite and Yellowstone. That way the elite MotUs won't have it to themselves.
On the other hand, can we corral the elite MotU into Yellowstone? Then mom nature will take care of them shorty!
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday October 30 2017, @06:02PM (6 children)
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday October 30 2017, @06:21PM (4 children)
The problem with using price to stem the flow is that you accentuate the rift between the people who can afford nature/culture and those who can't. $40 isn't a lot in the context of a family trip but it adds, especially if you're under 2x minimum wage. Museums costing essentially a hundred for a family is another example. It's not a poll tax, it's a knowledge tax.
We don't need more divisions.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday October 30 2017, @08:07PM (3 children)
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Monday October 30 2017, @09:29PM (2 children)
Disney's been throwing lots of money at that problem for years. Their current approach is to let people pre-register once for a guaranteed admission, and let them queue for first-come-first-serve outside of that slot.
The NPS doles out backcountry camping passes on a first-come also.
Even with free park access, it's not a cheap trip for most. The question is how many people in a park are too many, who sets the quota, and the specifics of enforcement.
Maintenance itself, for a Federally-controlled place maintained by the government for the benefit of all the people, should probably be covered in some tax form, with at-the-gate surcharges for those who hurt the infrastructures the most by coming in with oversized vehicles.
The girl coming in on a bike or on foot, and taking a grand total of two dumps during her stay, should definitely not have to pay $30.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday October 30 2017, @09:51PM (1 child)
(Score: 3, Interesting) by bob_super on Monday October 30 2017, @10:11PM
It's in TFS.
If the problem is infrastructure stress, I seriously doubt that people walking in/through are anywhere near enough to be significant in most of those parks.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday October 30 2017, @07:14PM
That one does NOT have an entrance fee. It also has an interstate highway the runs through it.
As parks go, it's lame but it's also the only one with mountains (barely) available to the southeastern USA.