Traveler's Views

A lawsuit Montana filed against the Interior Department and Yellowstone National Park Superintendent Cam Sholly claims the Park Service long has ignored Montana's concerns over free-roaming bison, but park correspondence says otherwise.

Here we are, five days into 2025. A fresh year is before us, waiting with promise. What will it deliver?

It's been a tumultuous four years for the National Park System and the National Park Service, with powerful storms and wildfires sweeping the parks, insufficient funding and declining staff when you consider the addition of ten units since President Biden took office, and some questionable decisions.

The National Park Service and its attorneys, the Justice Department, are running counter to the National Park Service Organic Act, and arguably to the aspirational goals of the Endangered Species Act, in their refusal to remove feral horses from Cumberland Island National Seashore.

A decade after the National Park Service acknowledged feral horses at Cumberland Island National Seashore are a nonnative species that has damaged natural, cultural, and historical resources and that a management plan needed to be developed for them, the agency still lacks such a plan and has endorsed a defense of legal technicalities to oppose emergency food and water for them.

The National Park Service has a toxic problem that no one wants to talk about, and that’s a problem.

Charles "Chuck" Sams came to the National Park Service's directorship as an outsider being counted on to improve employee morale, fight harassment in the agency, oversee how millions of Great American Outdoors Act dollars were being spent, and, as some believed, to be "a leader that NPS employees will admire and respect."

A snowy weekend with the prospect of two or three feet of fresh snow had me house-bound to a certain extent with plenty of time to wonder what the coming year will bring to the National Park System and related topics.

Should international visitors be charged more than U.S. residents to enter the National Park System?

Getting answers from the leadership of the National Park Service to questions of public interest has become more and more difficult, as the agency increasingly takes a no-comment approach to challenging, uncomfortable, or accountability issues.

With just a few weeks left before the prospect of a government shutdown rears its ugly head, there are some things that have crossed my mind lately.

Some lodging prices in Yellowstone National Park are effectively blocking a wide segment of Americans, whose tax dollars help pay for the National Park System out of experiencing a night or two in the park's iconic lodges.

In a baffling rationale, the National Park Service is willing to let endangered species be trampled by feral horses at Cumberland Island National Seashore because it doesn't see itself liable for what horses do.

Society should treasure the ecological services provided by the National Park System above the economic output.

Technology can be a great thing with many benefits, but it also can cause deadly problems. A recent news article raises concerns about a controversial issue when it comes to the National Park System: e-Bikes and your safety.

Raise the prospect of expanding the National Park System and you'll like illicit one of two responses, either, "That's great!," or, "Why bother, the National Park Service doesn't have the staffing or funding it needs to properly maintain what it has."

Last week on the National Parks Traveler’s podcast we talked with Yellowstone National Park Superintendent Cam Sholly about the state of his park. Part of that conversation touched on crowding and congestion, a problem a number of parks have been dealing with in recent years. It’s a good problem, in that more and more people want to visit these amazing places, but it’s not without its impacts on park resources.

Essential Coverage for Essential Places -- That's something we truly believe here at the National Parks Traveler. Units of the National Park System are amazing and priceless places. They are essential to our well-being and they deserve daily editorial coverage, something we manage to bring you thanks to the support of our readers and listeners.

Flamingoes, marine lizards, blue-footed boobies, and even diminutive Galápagos penguins.

Is the National Park System turning into an à la carte experience? That's not an unreasonable question when you explore the recreation.gov website in search of a national park experience.