From a report in the Los Angeles Times:
As the National Park Service begins planning for its 100th birthday in 2016, the venerable agency has reason to wonder who will show up.
By the services own reckoning, visits to national parks have been on a downward slide for 10 years. Overnight stays fell 20% between 1995 and 2005, and tent camping and backcountry camping each decreased nearly 24% during the same period.
Visits are down at almost all national parks, even at Yosemite, notorious for summertime crowds and traffic jams. Meanwhile, most of the 390 properties in the park system are begging for business.
“Most days, wed be delighted to see 10 people,” said Craig Dorman, superintendent at Lava Beds National Monument, a seldom-visited site near the California-Oregon border that is even emptier these days. “It was pretty crowded around here during the Modoc War,” he said, referring to the 1872 Modoc Indian uprising. “But there probably havent been that many people here since.”
Typically, families with children recede from the parks in the fall. Now, the retirees who traditionally take their place in the fall and winter are choosing to go elsewhere. Last year, about 569,000 vacationers went to Yosemite in July, nearly 20% fewer than in the same month in 1995. In January, there were 94,000 visitors, about 30% fewer than in January 1995.
NewMexiKen wonders how much of the recent drop-off is from foreign visitors. I’ve read recently that entering the U.S. has become so difficult (so much of a hassle) that many are traveling to other destinations.