A repeat of my 2018 stay at the Needles Campground in Canyonlands National Park likely will have to wait until 2020/Kurt Repanshek
Editor's note: This updates with response from recreation.gov's "escalation" desk, and includes terms of contract Booz Allen Hamilton negotiated.
Securing a campsite in a national park is not always an easy endeavor, and, unfortunately, recreation.gov does not always help.
The other day I searched for an available site at the Needles Campground (aka Squaw Flat Campground) in Canyonlands National Park in southeastern Utah. This is one of the best campgrounds in the Southwest. There are just 26 individual sites set amid the glorious redrock splendor of Canyonlands' Needles District. The sites are well spaced and offer a measure of solitude you don't always find in national park campgrounds, the restrooms are well kept up and even offer wash basins to do your dishes, and the night skies are wonderfully dark for star gazing.
The trick to landing a site, of course, is to start six months before you want to visit. My bad. I waited until six weeks out. Still, using recreation.gov to get a site was akin to hitting a moving target. First there were available sites, then there weren't. When I saw three consecutive dates in early April I wanted to go after, I tried to log into the site to snag them. It didn't like my email or password, so I created a new account. Sadly, it didn't like that new account it even after it verified it:
Are you sure you have the right email and password? Please double check your email and password, and try again. You can also click the links below to sign up for an account or reset your password. -- recreation.gov
I tried calling the folks at recreation.gov...and the recorded voice told there as a 43-minute wait time. So I tried the "chat" option. After a short wait, an agent chimed in to inquire what I needed. After I explained my dilemma, I was told my log-in issues could be solved by one of their agents ... if I called the reservations number.
See where this is going?
Is this the best way to run a reservation system for a sprawling system of some 100,000 campsites spread across the National Park System, U.S. Forest Service, and U.S. Bureau of Land Management. It's a timely question to ask, as last fall the reservation system was taken over by Booz Allen Hamilton, which Outside Magazine described as a "management consultant giant..." and which no doubt demonstrated its ability to handle the job when the contract came up. Under the terms of that ten-year contract, which kicked in October 1, Booz Allen Hamilton is being paid $182 million.
Giant they might be, but are they big enough or keen enough to manage this far-flung system? Supposedly one of the requirements for landing the contract was that Booz Allen Hamilton had to offer real-time reservation status. That might explain my experience with the "now you see them, now you don't" available campsites. They come and go as folks reserve a site, and then cancel their reservation. Ok, I get it. But there's more to running a reservation system than offering a tracking system that many others in the travel and dining industries long ago mastered. Operating a system that works, for instance.
Those behind the recreation.gov's call-in reservation system realized they wouldn't always have enough agents to handle call loads, and so designed the system to allow you to leave your phone number and they'd call you back...without you losing your place in line. I took that option, and within about 10 minutes got a call ... from a recorded voice that told me an agent would be with me shortly.
While I waited, I took another spin around recreation.gov's page for Canyonlands. A huge problem is that they haven't yet loaded maps of campgrounds, at least not those at Canyonlands, and so you can't look at the site you're being offered. Is your chosen site next door to the restrooms, and so you might have more foot traffic than usual day and night? How close to trailheads is it? Is there shade? Where are the water spigots? (I would come to learn that when Booz Hamilton got the recreation.gov contract, they had to build the system from scratch. They couldn't take what the previous company was using. But still, there are scads of park maps out there, including maps of campgrounds. Shouldn't a "management consultant giant" be able to fine-tune those rather quickly? Or pay someone to?)
After sitting on hold for eight minutes, not a long time, an agent tried to help me sort out my log-in credentials. He couldn't, even after verifying my email was in their system and walking me through a password reset (not that it's complicated, but he was trying to be helpful). No luck. Instead, he said he woud have to "escalate" my issue to a higher power. But he didn't know when -- In an hour? Later today? Tomorrow? Next week? -- or how -- email? phone call? text? carrier pigeon? -- I would be contacted. He also didn't know if they worked weekends, and didn't have any contact phone numbers for me to resort to. And while he told me that, those three available nights I wanted vanished.
Not that it matters, since I can't log in to reserve them.
A tech from the escalation team called back Monday morning, roughly 24 hours after my unhappy experience. After 10-15 minutes on the phone with him, during which I shared my browser screen so he could try to diagnose the problem...he was at a loss. His suggestion, while he consulted with others, was that I create a new account once again, but with a different email address. Or I could call their reservations line and hope that I get connected with someone before the sites and dates I want vanish.
That's my recreation.gov story. What's yours?
Comments
By rigged I mean that there is something hapening outside the "fair and equal access" that they claim. Recreation.gov runs the reservation system based on parameters that they are given. The local property managers (USFS, NPS) have access to controlling the system. That being said I have data for one particular cabin going back to 2009. Prior to securing that data I tried everything possible to be the quickest at pushing the button at 10 am EST. Nothing worked, including syncing server time protocols to Recreation.gov servers. After hearing all sorts of anecdotal stories of the same people getting reservations every year I pushed the envelope and began inquiring with various USFS supervisors and Recreation.gov personnel, all to no avail. Then in 2018 I filed the FOIA requests and started analyzing the names and the rumors were verified. Same people every season, some as many as 5 times in a season! The season is June 15th to Sept. 30th at this cabin or approximately 100+ days. One person actually booked 5 reservations totaling 30 days! I have written countless emails and I can tell you that it still is happening. Rigged, of course it is. How else can you explain the same people gettng it. It's statistically impossible. Bots? Who knows but if it was bots then with multiple bot programs out there why would only these same people be getting the cabin reservations? I suspect that there is much more to this cabin rental then we imagine. I have the names of the renters from the FOIA requests but the addresses are redacted so one can only imagine if they are connected to someone that has some pull. Time will tell.
In the mean time the system administrator is Rick DeLappe of the National Park Service who runs Recreation One Stop Program of which Recreation.gov is connected. If you are frustrated let him know. He testified before a congressional committee in 2016 and had nothing but glowing things to say about Recreation.gov..... Here's a snippet: (Read the full report that you can get online https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CHRG-114hhrg23482/html/CHRG-114hhrg2...)
Hearing held on May 24, 2016..................................... 1
WITNESSES
Mr. Joe Meade, Director, Recreation, Heritage, and Volunteer
Resources, U.S. Forest Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture,
Accompanied by Rick Delappe, Program Manager, Recreation One-
Stop, National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior
Oral Statement............................................... 3
Written Statement............................................ 6
EXAMINING THE FUTURE OF RECREATION.GOV
This was Mr. DeLappe's closing statement
I would like to say that, you know, Recreation.gov is
probably one of the best programs in the government. We get to
work with fun, and we love--the people that work on our staff
are outdoors folks, are passionate about this job. We want to
make it right, and the way we want to do that is we want to
engage with the end users, the States, the local communities to
make sure that we're building a product that suits their needs,
not ours.
--------
I have had a much different experience with the system, along with many others. Once again these are federal lands that should be made accessible to all not just the few that have figured out a way to manipulate the system.
I will continue to pursue this unfairness, not for my own personal gain, but so that everyone will have the same opportunity to enjoy these national treasures. Stay tuned....
RickF
NH
Our family vacation was cancelled the day before we were to arrive at the campsite of Holly Bay in Kentucky. We reserved and paid for our week long vacation months in advance. Its our annual lake vacation. We also rented a camper to be delivered with no refunds. We were emailed confirmation that we did not need to do anything if our reservation had some days which were closed due to covid 19. Our only day was the first day, so we kept our reservation for the rest the same, since we were told by recreation.gov all is well. Then whammy, the day before we were to leave for the trip, we were told by other family members that we better check our reservation because something has gone terribly wrong with the website reservations, they were all cancelled by recreation.gov and resold to someone else, that day. I will update this tragic situation as it unfolds. Needless to say we are devastated, with our vacation ruined and loss of money
We had to leave a week early at a National Monument back in June. Have tried ever since to get a refund. Can't get the recreation.gov people on the phone. Had a 5 hour wait time on chat when I gave up. That is not a typo FIVE hours.
Finally got them this week on chat- they said they can't tell me the status of the refund and told me to call the National Monument. Which I did and got a very helpful gentleman who looked and said they never got the refund request from back around June 29. Sigh. He suggested I resubmit it.
Well guess what, you can't request a refund after more than 7 days of the reservation have elapsed. BUT- the phone system has an option to talk to an agent about a refund. So when you select that option via your phone keypad, ie press 2, it then switches to using voice prompts. So when it asks me to say "refund" or "status" I can say either one and NOTHING happens it keeps asking me to say it. I tried at least a dozen times.
Update to my post above- I did finally receive my refund from recreation.gov thanks to the very helpful NPS employee. I bet I spent a good 8 hours on this over weeks.
I am not able to figure out how to pay or follow through with the reservation on the site... Any help might you have? It's not the first time I've been on the site and gotten Skunked
Thank you
Surely the contractor can employ software to detect and prevent this.
I have never seen any campsite, cabin, backcountry permit or cave tour "resold" anywhere online. Has anyone else?
Might tour companies be using this technology for thier private clients? Thus one would never see individual sites or tours being "resold"....
I think the whole system has to go. I have been trying to make reservations for camping using the six month out window (which is rediculous in itself). Every campground that I go to make a reservation is book the whole month beyond the "window of availability" dates. When calling Reservation.Gov, I was told that one can book a campsite beyond the "window of availability". There are folks playing the system, reserving whole blocks of sites and making no campspites available for people wanting to just take their kids out for a two day campout. It is almost impossible to be spontaneous anymore with camping. So, here is what I think needs to happen. The Reservation.Gov site needs a huge makeover. I feel only the group sites should be reservable in advance, and only 10% of the regular camp sites should be able to be reserved, and the remaining 90% of any given campsite shoud be First Come, First Served.
The system is making a ton of money. They charge fees to book, and fees to cancel. I'm sure the US Forest Service is paying huge amounts of money to this 3rd party system. I think we need to speak to our state representatives to start the process of getting rid of this ugly system. Who is with me?? Shouldn't our national forest recreational sites be open for enjoyment to all?
RickF, I know without a doubt the system is rigged. I live in Oregon, and I have talked to so many people that are frustrated with the system because there is never any availability for campsites when booking even six months in advance. When I called Recreation.gov, I was told that once someone has made a reservation, they can block out the next 13 days (even if those dates are not within the rolling availability dates). That alone should never be allowed. The window for summer camping enjoyment is so short as it is and if people are allowed to get 14 days at once, that makes it difficult for others to get a reservation. But even with these 14 day reservation block, still something doesn't add up. Here it is 6 months ahead (Feb) and yet the entire month of July and August and half of September are already reserved at many of the mountain lakes and the Oregon coastal campgrounds. If I were able to do the research, I'm almost betting it is one or two people who have figured out how to reserve several sites.
When we have driven through some of these fully reserved campgrounds, we see that every site has a reserved sign, and yet so many of those campsites are empty. When talking to the camphost and inquiring about all the sites sitting empty when familites could be enjyoing them, we were told that the those sites "were paid for already" and that was that.
It looks like our national parks and forests have turned into a mega corporation and profit is the only goal. I think it is time to start some sort of petition and make noise to change this rigged system that clearly is not working us. Your post was very helpful in that it gave the names of those responsibile for this mess. I now have a person to target my frustrations and will be contacting Rick DeLappe. If enough people voice their concerns maybe we can go camping with our families again.
P.S. I don't give up easily!