It's going to cost a bit more next year to hike through Muir Woods National Monument/Kurt Repanshek
Fees to visit Muir Woods National Monument in California will double on January 1, moving from $5 per person to $10, with other fee increases coming to Alcatraz Island and the paid parking area at the Presidio in San Francisco.
Golden Gate National Recreation Area officials say children under 16 visiting Muir Woods will continue to gain free entrance.
Parking fees at Battery East and West Bluff parking areas in Golden Gate National Recreation Area increased on June 1 by 20 cents an hour, with a maximum increase of $1 per day. This increase is to bring the cost of parking to a maximum of $7 a day or $1.20 an hour, which is consistent with parking fees in the Presidio.
On October 1, a $1 increase to the Expanded Amenity Fee for Alcatraz Island will take effect.
The last federal fee increase at Muir Woods was in 2007 and there have been no prior increases to the expanded amenity fees at Alcatraz or at the fee parking areas.
'This increase in fees will allow us to continue to protect, preserve and share the special places here at Golden Gate National Recreation Area with current visitors and future generations,' said Golden Gate Superintendent Chris Lehnertz. 'After carefully considering the impact of fee increases on visitors and community members, we came to the conclusion that this is the right course of action to help improve facilities and services important to visitors.'
Fees support a wide range of projects that improve the park and visitor experiences, including rehabilitating trails and trailheads, developing and exhibits, improving park infrastructure, and improving accessibility. This additional revenue will allow us to continue to invest in the improvements necessary to provide the best possible park experience for our visitors including enhancement of visitor facilities and services.
In the fall of 2014, the National Park Service conducted a nationwide review of entrance fees. To solicit public input, Golden Gate launched a civic engagement campaign with approximately a two month comment period in November of 2014. The comments generally supported an increase in these fees.
Location
Current Fee
Approved Fee Increase
Date of Implementation
Muir Woods
$5 Entrance Fee
$20 Annual Pass
$10 Entrance Fee
$40 Annual Pass
January 1, 2016
Alcatraz
$1Expanded Amenity Fee
$2 Expanded Amenity Fee
October 1, 2015
Presidio Paid Parking
· West Bluff Lot
· Battery East Lot
$1 per hour
$6 per day
Expanded Amenity Fee
$1.20 per hour
$7 per day
Expanded Amenity Fee
June 1, 2015
Comments
I'm curious, can the NPS raise fees as often as they want or is there a moratorium for x number of years after a fee increase? Most of these increases seem excessive to me given the low inflation and even lower wage increases (at least in the private sector) the last decade. That is unless they are prohibited from raising them again for say 10 years or the plan is to ensure another increase doesn't happen for that period of time (and estimates are made for inflation going forward)? If so it would help the public perception if they stated that when increases were announced. I am also somewhat puzzled by the public comments always supporting the fee increases. I love the parks as much as anyone but supporting higher costs seems to go against human nature. Are the questions crafted in such a way to skew the comments or is there really that much public support for increased fees? I did note the wording that said "generally" supported.
Wild Places,
You should be very skeptical when public comments always support fee increases because they really don't. How do I know this? Because of my experience here in the Smokies. Case in point: When they tried to ram a fee down our throats several years ago for backcountry camping I requested a copy of the public comments and was told it would cost 1200 dollars. After that didn't run me away, I appealed their decision through an attorney and guess what? The comments overwhelmingly opposed a fee for that activity but the NPS spun the results (which were almost 20 to 1 in opposition and almost a thousand folks took the time to say so, ) by saying that many of the respondents "didn't understand the concept of a fee and were misinformed about the fee.
The NPS is full of crooked fee hungry bureaucrats who are worse at spin than the Pentagon. And if you were to FOIA the responses, I'll bet you would find a lot of similar bs from Jarvis henchmen.
How ironic that Muir Woods is a recepient of this double taxation. What would John Muir say about having to pay to use public lands? Does jarvis even know who Muir is? The agency has seriously lost its way. I call it the Ken Burns effect. His "America's Best Idea" has been exploited my "America's best manipulators" of which Jarvis is the head honcho and REI/oil executive Sally Jewell is a fine addition to that club.
And don't think you have any recourse with the NPS. It is one agency that operates with virtually no oversight. I was told by my congressman that I might as well forget ever challenging them. He was right.
It is good to be king.
Smokies, can you provide a link or copy of that record of comments? Let the rest of us see it. Then we can decide for ourselves who is right.
How funny. Lee wants someone to substantiate their claim after he has done nothing but run when asked to do the same.
Yes, Martin did the same thing at GRCA with the public comments during his tenure as Superintendent. Kurt has them on file, I believe.
Kurt? Do you?
It's pretty pathetic though, that people who are willing to pay $100+ each month for TV and another $100 for smart phone fees, squawk about a small increase to pay for services they use in parks.
Heck, y'pay $10 just to go see a bad movie and almost as much for popcorn and sody pop.
I guess it's all in one's priorities.
Lee, the topic at the time was the Mules in the Canyon. He wanted to and did for the most part, get rid of them (by 75%) and the 100+ years of a truly American experience. You know, the poo on the trail sissy thing. Not fee increases.
Like the rest of NPS employees your mind has been made up from the get go Dalton. But for others unfamiliar with the track record of fee abuse and subsequent data manipulation so.characteristic of Jarvis cabal, here is your link. /2011/12/hiker-wants-great-smokies-mountain-national-park-divulge-comments-proposed-backcountry-fee9125