Arches National Park staff has been told to look at solutions other than a reservation system to deal with traffic congestion/NPS file

Public concern over the possibility that a reservations system for visitors at Arches National Park could cost the Moab area upwards of $22 million in lost economic spending has prompted the National Park Service to take a look at several other options for managing traffic in the iconic park in southeastern Utah.

Among the additional areas park staff will examine are a shuttle system, which previously was deemed impractical, and a secondary entrance road, something Utah's governor has suggested.

"We're talking additional visitor use data, additional transportation alternatives, exploring additional measures to mitigate vehicle congestion, and then some specifics that have come out of that," Marco De Leon, chief of public affairs for the Park Service's Intermountain Region, said Monday during an interview. "There may be more forthcoming in the future. But specifically, we're looking at a feasibility study for a shuttle system, a feasibility study for a secondary entrance road, as well as an updated visitor use study for the park."

Arches is not alone in grappling with crowding issues. Yellowstone, Zion, Yosemite, Acadia, Grand Canyon, and Glacier national parks all struggle at times during the year with overcrowding. Zion officials have been working on their own management plan for some time, and it, too, includes provisions for reservations, though they might not be included in the final proposal.

Last summer, Arches staff received a report on how requiring reservations for visitors would impact the area's economy. The economist who prepared the study predicted the annual loss initially could range anywhere from $11 million to $22 million. But Robert Paterson, of the Cambridge, Massachuetts, firm of Industrial Economics, Incorporated, also acknowledged that his work so far could not predict the long-term impact to the area's economy. And he predicated his estimate based on other national parks that used various approaches to deal with congestion.

Two years ago the Arches staff released the draft plan that proposed reservations during peak visitation months. Such a plan is needed, they said at the time, to address vehicle traffic and parking congestion problems that affect visitor access, visitor enjoyment, and resource conditions. With a very limited road system, built around the 18-mile-long main road, traffic can quickly slow to a crawl during the spring, summer, and fall seasons at the park's main attractions, such as Delicate Arch, the Windows Section, and Devils Garden.

There have been times that traffic trying to get into Arches backed up onto U.S. 191, prompting the Utah Highway Patrol to close the entrance road.

Under the park's proposal, a reservation system would be implemented for high-visitation seasons and peak-visitation hours. As envisioned, this system would give visitors certainty of entry, reduce or eliminate long entrance lines, spread visitation more evenly across the day, and improve the visitor experience by ensuring available parking space, a park release said in January 2018. 

Such a reservation system, noted economist Paterson, "may enhance visitor experience and increase the economic value of trips to" the national park. 

While parks such as Acadia, Zion, Bryce Canyon and Rocky Mountain have turned to shuttle bus systems to help manage traffic and congestion, the staff at Arches concluded a few years ago that that was not a reasonable solution for their park.

Although it may seem that the shuttle would be the solution, the length of the park’s road system, a total of 52 miles, and the distance between several key areas in the park, planners concluded that in the best-case scenario it would result in a reduction of 23-28 percent of cars, require one-way travel times up to one hour and 20 minutes, and would require $3 million to operate during a five-month season under a service contract. This cost does not include purchasing and maintaining the 14 buses required to provide the service. Arches also looked at the shuttle operations at Zion, Bryce and Rocky Mountain national parks and noted that although visitors enjoyed this option, the pulses of 40 plus visitors who were dropped off on a trail at one time was causing resource damage and more crowding on the trails.

 

A group in Moab has been lobbying for a shuttle-type approach to solving the traffic issues. They have proposed a huge parking area outside of the park, with shuttles hauling visitors to Arch. This approach, being pushed by a group calling itself "Arches For The People," would create "the first fully sustainable, noise free, and zero emissions national park by 2030," they claim.

Michael Liss, who heads the group, said the decision to pull back the reservations proposal came from acting Interior Secretary David Bernhardt.

"Apparently the new Secretary of the Interior (sic) got on the phone with Acting NPS Intermountain Regional Director Kate Hammond and the decision was reached ... and Arches has been advised to stand down on the advanced reservations proposal and instead look at alternative solutions including a shuttle system and paving the existing dirt road North Entrance," Liss said in an email. "Secretary Bernhardt seems to be taking a very activist position ... so getting involved in Arches and making a quick, decisive executive decision fits right in."

Back in Denver at the Park Service, De Leon couldn't say how involved the acting Interior secretary was. But he did say the public concern raised by the economic report prompted the decision to revisit other possible solutions to the traffic jams.

"We take the comments of stakeholders and the public very seriously, and we evaluate that feedback very carefully. And so this is part of that process of taking a step back and making sure that we're being responsive to the public and their concerns," he said.

In general, De Leon, said, the Park Service realizes there are crowding issues at some parks and the agency wants to approach solutions as transparently and responsively as possible. 

"We're aware that it's a problem and that's why we're so focused on it. We talk about the preservation of resources. We also talk about the enjoyment of future generations," he said. "And I think at a certain point congestion can lead to an eroded visitor experience, and we certainly don't want that either. So I think either way you slice it, from a resource impact side to a visitor enjoyment side, we know that it is a problem that we are working on addressing."