McPadden shrugs off crowds, Glacier Point to open

 

By TOM LYDEN

Staff Writer

Yosemite National Park Superintendent Ray McPadden shrugged off headlines about overcrowding as the summer season begins without a vehicle reservation system, blaming activist groups who project “what the park experience should be like.”

“Saturdays are really busy in the park, and then other days are fine,” McPadden said. 

McPadden expects some of that congestion to be relieved this weekend when the road to Glacier Point opens. 

Tioga Pass is expected to open mid-May, he said.

McPadden made his remarks on Thursday during the release of the Red Legged Frog in Yosemite Valley. It was a beautiful and calm day in the park. 

He said there is no evidence that crowds have damaged the park’s ecology.

Headlines in the Los Angeles Times, SF Gate and other media outlets have recently referenced a “free-for-all” and chaos in the park with hour-and-a-half delays at the South Entrance. 

McPadden said that is typical for a Saturday morning in the summer, during an atypically warm spring. 

He specifically criticized the Los Angeles Times for using a photo showing a long line of vehicles in Yosemite Valley in 2017. It was clearly identified as a 2017 file photo.

“There’s outlets that are desperate for readers and they’re just willing to say anything. They’re recycling pictures from 10 or 15 years ago. It’s crazy,” he said.

McPadden said plans are underway for a customer satisfaction survey of people who travel to Yosemite.

The survey will be at the peak of summer, he suggested, and will ask about entrance lines at the gate and for people to rate their overall experience.

He said he wants the survey to be “scientific” and “real social science,” something he said that has been lacking in previous assessments.

“I think one of the weaknesses with hyper restrictive reservation systems is we never really asked the public how their experience was in a scientific way, or a defensible way,” McPadden said.  

McPadden specifically blamed activist groups that say “this is what the park experience should be.”

“But that’s not necessarily what everybody wants,” he said.

He said reactions that dominate social media currently come from “angry people” offering “anecdotal stuff.” 

But some of the staunchest critics are people who actually live in the park, he acknowledged.

“The people who live here and work here tend to be much more sensitive to lines and all that stuff. So we, the park service, perceive some huge catastrophic problem,” he said.

But if you ask the visitor, he said, they will say, “I’m having a great time. No problem. What are you talking about?”

According to attendance numbers from the National Park Service, visitation to Yosemite was up 45 percent in March from the prior year.

McPadden expects those numbers to level off a bit in April. 

But with 90-degree weather this weekend, he suggested people consider YARTS or chartered tours if they want to avoid long entrance lines. 

“I’m expecting visitation to go up. We have lots of space for people to have a good time,” McPadden said.