Global Courant
Waterfalls may be free-flowing in Yosemite National Park after record-breaking precipitation, but lines outside the park are often at a standstill this season — the first summer without a reservation system since before the pandemic.
Employees, visitors and residents report cars parked illegally in lanes, on grass and between rocks, with long queues.
Visitors arriving after 8 a.m. on weekends and some weekdays should be ready for a trickier park experience. Those arriving later will not be able to find parking and can expect to have to turn back if they try to enter the eastern Yosemite Valley, according to the Yosemite National Park Facebook page, which has provided updates on parking capacity. Text updates are also available by texting ynptraffic to 333111.
When first-time visitor Al Malecha went to Yosemite with her friends for Juneteenth, traffic ground to a halt about 80 miles outside of Yosemite Valley, she said. At that moment she jumped out of the car, walked around and cracked open a beer.
“You saw a lot of other people in their cars doing the same, just because we were standing still for so long. I think people were running out of gas,” she said. It took her group 2½ hours to reach the gate, then another hour to reach the parking lot.
A trail of red brake lights leads from Juneteenth to Yosemite National Park on weekends.
(Al Malecha)
In the park, Malecha noticed red pieces of paper decorated on cars wedged in “made-up” parking lots. The plan was to use the park shuttles to get around, but reports of queues of up to an hour led the group to stay afloat.
Stephanie Rainwater, an employee at Tenaya, a resort three miles from the park, said she has seen traffic stretch past the lodge in worst cases, preventing employees from going to work. She noted that this is not a regular occurrence.
“We’re definitely more busy than last season,” Rainwater said. “We’re adjusting our tours to leave earlier to avoid some of that congestion there.”
This summer vacation is unique for a number of reasons. Visitors no longer need to make reservations for Yosemite, as has been the case for the past three years, prompting a mix of responses.
It also comes on the heels of record-breaking precipitation, which charged the park’s falls to unusually high flows, but dashed many visitors’ spring plans as flood warnings led to parks, roads and campgrounds closing.
The heavy snow pack closed two roads, which remain closed — Tioga Road and Glacier Point Road — forcing cars to cram in even more. Beginning Saturday morning, Glacier Point Road will reopen until 10 p.m. on July 4. As of July 15, the road is almost back to normal use, with a delay of 30 minutes.
A few other road projects that caused delays of 15 to 30 minutes over the past month should be back to normal in July. Big Oak Flat Road and El Portal Road are set on close constructionaccording to the Yosemite National Park Service website.
Beth Pratt, regional executive director of the National Wildlife Federation in California, has lived and worked outside of Yosemite for 25 years. She said that without even trying to enter the park, she and other local residents were stuck in traffic, just trying to go about their business. Put off by the crowds, she has only attempted to enter the park once this season.
“I feel sorry for these people. I want people to love parks,” Pratt said. “When you come to Yosemite and it’s like being on 101 in LA, you’re not coming back. keep parks and we want them to have a national park experience – that’s not about traffic and parking.”
Traffic is one thing, but Pratt said her bigger concern is how that visit will affect wildlife in the park. Before the pandemic, she said she was starting to see increasing environmental damage, from scattered litter and graffiti to park visitors driving on pastures. After the reservation system was put in place, “the park experience went back to being one of what a park should be,” she said.
Annual Yosemite visits rose to more than 5 million people in 2016, then dropped to 2 million to 3 million during the pandemic in 2020 and 2021, when the reservation system was in effect.
With visitation levels returning to pre-pandemic levels and demand continuing to increase, Pratt said an equitable booking system needs to be implemented.
“To protect (Yosemite) for future generations, we’re going to have to set some boundaries,” she said. “This is not the park system of 10 or 20 years ago. There’s a lot more demand and it’s clearly not just Yosemite. The entire park system, especially the larger parks, is really struggling with this.”
Last December through February 3, the National Park Service accepted visitor feedback for solutions.
Yosemite spokesman Scott Gediman said he was unable to respond to requests for comment.
As this season’s long lines continue, the National Park Service recommends that visitors arrive early and stay late, avoid weekends, and take a Yosemite Area Regional Transportation System (YARTS) bus to enter the park.
