2012 numbers appeared to be up because people, mostly not staying on seashore, wanted to see the new temporary bridge and other rubber necking of the hurricane damage. Most of the businesses say people we're just driving through And that's what I observed. Reality is that visitation is way down, ask ANY business located within the park.

I realize the liberal enviro wackos are against economic prosperity but it does hurt real people. Oh yeah, people are bad too...

Wayne Cone was one of a kind.

Ron, he was Director at Albright when I attended Intro to Park Operations in 1968. Did he become superintendent at Yosemite after Larry Hadley?

Could it be that those liberal enviro wackos are just driving through because they don't want to spend money with businesses that think their customers are liberal enviro wackos?

Beach, economists and state and county records seem to disagree with your conclusions. Here's part of a report given to the Outer Banks Chamber of Commerce in April 2012 by Dr. James Kleckley, of East Carolina University:

The Outer Banks was not immune to the 2008-2009 recession, but visitors continued to come to the area to enjoy its amenities. For example, a look at a major occupancy measure in Dare County (the Outer Bank jurisdiction that currently shoulders the bulk of the tourism hotels and restaurants) showed essentially flat visitation activity from the summer of 2008 to the beginning of 2010. However, the results showed that the year-to-year activity increased in the summer of 2010. Retail sales estimates support this upturn. So, while businesses in the area suffered like many in the rest of the nation, the regional downturn was not as severe. Tourists continued to come.

The largest negative impact to the Outer Banks economy was felt in real estate and construction. The region experienced a dramatic slowdown in the demand for second homes, retirement homes, and resort investment property – and this sector of the economy (which includes construction) is not expected to recover in the near future. However, the national economy improves, the demand for retirement homes and second homes should recover and buyers should once again begin taking advantage of the opportunities found in the local housing market.

Further, the state Commerce Department reports that in Dare County median family income grew 35 percent from 2000 to 2011, to $66,628, that July 2013 employment was up more than 5,000 from 2012, and unemployment was down from 11.3 percent to 6.9 percent.

Further, according to the Outer Banks Visitors Bureau, restaurant business in 2012 was up 9.3 percent over 2011, and through the first nine months of 2013 it was up 2.12 percent. The $208,655,656 gross in meal sales for 2012 was the highest going back to 2000 at least.

Gross occupancy income for the Outer Banks hit $385,182,596 in 2012, a 4 percent increase over 2011 (and seeming record high), and through September 2013 it was running nearly 3 percent ahead of 2012 levels, according to the Visitors Bureau.

Also, year-to-date occupancy on Hatteras Island lodgings was up 2.13 percent through September. Most interesting is that the highest bump in lodgings came at Buxton, up 7.4 percent through September. The only decrease was at Frisco, just half-a-percent.

So it would seem that restaurants and lodgings were seeing an increase in business in recent years.

Lee, most liberal enviro wackos judge and dictate without ever visiting in the first place, part of where the wacko component comes from and just fuels the frustration. Life on CHNSRA ain't the same as Chapel Hill...

In his April 2013 statement on the sequester Director Jarvis states:

"We excluded positions that are required to ensure the health and safety of visitors and employees or protect resources and assets"

http://www.nps.gov/legal/testimony/113th/Oversight%20Hearing%20on%20Fede...

So having lifeguards in the Graveyard of the Atlantic isn't required to ensure the safety of visitors?

Following Jarvis's own directive there should have been furloughs of non essential staff before cuts to visitor protection were made so how many office workers in the OBX group have been furloughed before the OBX group superintendent was forced to do this? None of course. And none of those HQ people will have be out on the beach next July face to face with a distraught family member after their loved one gets pulled out by a rip current --some field ranger who arrives twenty minutes after the event will be faced with that.

Meanwhile Eugene O'Neil NHS with its average of ten visitors a day and New Orleans Jazz NHP and all the other pork barrel parks will be open for business.

Lee, Wayne Cone was the Yosemite superintendent who succeeded Larry Hadley in late 1970. He had perhaps the shortest tenure in that position of any Yosemite park superintendent. Rumors have it that he opposed the contruction of a Wells Fargo Bank in Yosemite Village, which upset the park concessioner, and which inturn led to a rapid administrative re-assignment and a change of address. Perhaps there were other factors in the works as well? Wayne Cone was an inspiration to all of us who had the chance to work under his leadership.

Thanks, Owen. That helped jog my memory and I do vaguely recall the Wells Fargo flap. Maybe I didn't know that Wayne was its victim.

Just one more example of outside political pressures running the NPS. I wonder which Congressman was dipping into a WF money bag?