Yosemite National Park to drop booking system

The announcement was made by the National Park Service.

The iconic park will eliminate visitor reservations during the summer of 2023. The booking system, implemented during the Covid-19 outbreak, required visitors to make a reservation before heading into the park. Since the implementation of the system back in 2020, this rule applied on and off until the autumn season of 2022. Now, it will be off again for the next summer.

“Reservations will not be required to visit Yosemite National Park during the summer of 2023. Reservations were required in the summers of 2020 and 2021 due to the pandemic and in the summer of 2022 when numerous key visitor attractions were closed for critical infrastructure repairs,” quotes the National Park Service webpage.

Yosemite also tried out a lottery method for summer bookings at one of its most attractive camp-grounds last year.

When advance reservations were necessary, guests had to reserve permission to access the park seven days a week during peak hours. The regulation was put in place to help avoid overcrowding at the famous site, as the rule managed to spread the number of visitors throughout the day, this way also protecting the flora and fauna in the park, as well as making the visitors’ experience more enjoyable.

Of course, there were also critics of the system stating that people should not make reservations when visiting public spaces.

As for now, while reservations will no longer be needed, the NPS has stated that it will explore different strategies to minimize overcrowding in the future.

“Yosemite has been grappling with congestion — even gridlock — for decades. We want to build from the lessons learned from the last three [summers] of managed access. Look for an announcement in December, when we'll start seeking your help to design an approach that provides a great visitor experience while protecting Yosemite's natural and cultural resources,” added the NPS website.

However, the National Park Service advises visitors to plan their trip ahead of time, as finding an available camp-ground might nevertheless require making a reservation three or four months in advance. Guests of Yosemite National Park must also pay a $35 admission tax per vehicle, which is valid for a week.

Yosemite National Park is a natural reserve in California flanked on the southeast by the Sierra National Forest and on the northwest by the Stanislaus National Forest. The park is overseen by the National Park Service and spans four counties, beginning in Tuolumne and Mariposa and continuing north and east to Mono and south to Madera.

Yosemite National Park was recognized as a World Heritage Site in 1984 for its natural biodiversity, as it is also one of the Sierra Nevada's largest habitat areas supporting a diverse range of wildlife and plants.

According to admission data, Yosemite was among the top 25 most-visited National Park Service locations in 2021, and the eighth-most visited nature reserve in the US.

Source: travelandleisure.com