Visitation to Great Smoky Mountains National Park boomed in October/NPS
Visitation to national parks this October had to be higher than 2013 numbers, if only because of last year's partial government shutdown that closed the parks. But this October saw a tremendous bounce at Great Smoky Mountains National Park, where visitation was the highest in nearly 30 years.
Park officials say 1,261,104 people visited Great Smoky last month, adding that October typically is the second busiest month of the year for the park as visitors come to see the park's fall foliage. This year, visitors continued to come to the park despite record rainfall at the beginning of the month, a strong wind event, and a major snow storm on the last day of the month, park official said. Before this October, that month's highest visitation came in 1987, when 1,576,500 visitors came to the park.
Although visitation through the park's major entrances at Gatlinburg, Townsend, and Cherokee was up, outlying areas led the way in making this month the fourth-highest October on record, park officials said. Visitation at the outlying areas of the park in October was 73 percent above the 20-year average. Outlying areas include places like Foothills Parkway, Cosby, Big Creek, Greenbrier, Deep Creek, Cataloochee, and Abrams Creek.
In light of a lawsuit pending against the park in a bid to overturn a $4 per night per person backcountry fee, notable among October's visitation numbers were those for backcountry use. October saw 10,294 backcountry users, which brought the yearly tally to 80,595. According to Park Service numbers, such high use hadn't been seen since October 2011, when 9,488 people headed into the backcountry and the year-to-date total was 81,815. Prior to that, one needed to go back to October 1999, when 11,414 backcountry users were counted, and the year-to-date tally stood at 85,041.
Visitation has been up nearly every month this year with over eight million people visiting the park so far. The highest annual visitation on record was set in 1999 when 10,283,598 people visited Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Through this October, visitation to Great Smoky stood at 8,849,976, according to Park Service data.
Support Essential Coverage of Essential Places
Comments
No shows happen all the time in the front country, too. I am currently in a SC state park on the beach where campsites are nearly impossible to get on weekends, even during winter. And yet, a 1/3 of the sites are empty due to no shows (they are in the system as reserved). These sites are $30/night and people don't bother to cancel. It is pretty easy to see why people wouldn't bother to cancel for $4/night.
When I was in the smokies last month I got a site for a week because some else canceled. But the campground, booked full for the weekend, had dozens of open sites due to no shows. People can now book months in advance. Then they forget or plans change.
You can only book smokies back country sites 30 days in advance. Unless you are a guide service that can log into the system and book a site full then change it to keep non guided taxpaying peons away from their private gains from public lands.
Jim Casada made this bogus claim about me in his forum. He claims I said the following on this page:
Once again, I made no such claim about backcountry campsites, and did not mention anything about backcountry site use on this thread. Can you point to where I said any such thing on this page, jim? So quit twisting my words!! The reality was the park was busy, the roads were crowded, and businesses in Gatlinburg-Pigeon Forge-Townsend, etc were booming in October. Those are facts and reality. I was inside the park boundary 25 of 31 days, jimbo. Were you? Were you in the park AT ALL? Having a few people make claims that they didn't encounter anyone along trails like rabbit branch, or miri ridge, or a few other trails on the west side, does not mean the park wasn't crowded in other areas. Those trails are low hanging fruit, and well off most people's radar and are barely trekked even during the busiest times .. ENJOY the fact that areas like that still exist in GSMNP, if you can somehow attempt to pull yourself out of grinch mode ..
Regardless, I never made any comment about backcountry use in this entire thread. I don't whine about the backcountry 24/7, and am not in the business to spread misinformation and propaganda to "get donations" so I can use those funds to pay lawyers to file lawsuit after lawsuit to sue the park. That's your world. Point is October was very busy. I live next to the park, and I saw it with my own eyes. I don't need heresay from someone sitting on a computer way out in knoxville or even further out in Kentucky that are only in the park a few times a month. June and July were also very busy this year and the stats do show that. Regardless, if you dont trust the statistics to claim the park doesn't have ANY traffic is a joke. The park is quite busy and anyone that is involved saw it. Learn to read and quote me in context, please! Because it would make the misinformation you try to constantly spread about me more pallatable…I definitely did not trek every trail in the park checking on backcountry accommodations, nor do I care. That is your fight, and seems to consume a good portion of your life. Even though I do encounter backcountry campers throughout the year, i'm not keeping data, nor do I care to do so. So don't pull me into your battles with the NPS, when all I stated that the park was crowded in October.