Coronavirus no doubt was the dominant story that swirled about the National Park System throughout 2020, though it wasn't the only significant story. We saw passage of the Great American Outdoors Act, which was a plus, but also saw environmental laws and regulations tossed aside as construction of a border wall through Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument and Coronado National Memorial proceeded.
The lack of a Senate-confirmed National Park Service director also was a constant issue, as it has been the last four years since President Trump took office. How much that affected employee morale across the Park Service is hard to gauge, as the pandemic also impacted morale, as did the stress of trying to do more with less.
"There's no question that the Trump administration has diminished the value of civil service or public service for many agencies," Max Stier, president of the nonpartisan Partnership for Public Service, told NPR. "And you can see that just in the morale scores of those agencies themselves."
But the latest scores have been missing. The annual Best Places To Work in Federal Government survey didn't materialize in mid-December as it usually does, while the 2019 survey ranked the Park Service 348 out of 413 agencies in terms of "effective leadership."
Largely lurking in the background is the question of how much power a president has under The Antiquities Act. While that act, passed in 1906, allows presidents to "declare by public proclamation historic landmarks, historic and prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic or scientific interest that are situated upon the lands owned or controlled by the Government of the United States to be national monuments," President Trump believed that it also gave him the authority to shrink the size of a monument established by a predecessor.
Whether Trump had that power when he greatly reduced both Grand Staircase-Escalante and Bears Ears national monuments in Utah in 2017 remains to be seen. Litigation over his actions remains active, though the U.S. Bureau of Land Management has crafted management plans for the redesigned monuments that open lands once inside the original boundaries of the monuments to mining and other resource-impacting uses.
Here's a look at some of the top stories that flowed across the park system in 2020:
Parks got creative in 2020 to keep their employees distanced from visitors to prevent the spread of Covid-19/NPS file
Covid-19
The coronavirus pandemic quickly gained traction this year, with Statue of Liberty National Monument closing in mid-March due to the infectious disease. That was just among the first indications that 2020 would be a different year in the parks.
The Coalition to Protect America's National Parks said national park facilities that bring park staff and visitors in close proximity should be closed, the National Parks Conservation Association soon thereafter called for the entire park system to close, Utah health officials urged visitors to avoid Arches and Canyonlands national parks, in large part because the Moab hospital had only 17 beds, and no ICU beds, and while park superintendents in mid-March were given the authority to do what they thought best to prevent the spread of coronavirus in the parks, that wasn't always the case.
In many cases park staff had to get letters from local health officials asking for their park to be closed before Interior would OK it. At Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona, even those were slow to bring results.
The pandemic saw river runners who had waited years to float the Colorado River through Grand Canyon lose their 2020 put-in dates, concessionaires were hit hard by the shuttering of lodges and the sharp decrease in visitors in some cases, and there was pushback from visitors who wanted parks to remain open. Gateway businesses tried to be as flexible as possible to weather the pandemic.
But the pandemic also spawned some incredible creativity among park staff as they worked to cope with the pandemic. Some parks turned to reservation systems to manage visitor numbers, while others offered virtual experiences for those visitors who couldn't travel.
While vaccines have been approved to combat Covid-19, rollout will be slow. How the National Park Service and its concessionaires approach the 2021 high season and dealing with the disease remains to be seen.
You can find Traveler's coverage of the pandemic at this page.
A new Lewis River Bridge is coming to Yellowstone National Park thanks to the Great American Outdoors Act/NPS file
Great American Outdoors Act
Years in the making, this massive legislative package will provide both $6.5 billion to help the National Park Service deal with its maintenance backlog and fully fund the Land and Water Conservation Fund with $900 million that can be tapped to acquire lands for the park system.
The $6.5 billion is to be disbursed to the Park Service over five years specifically to address items on its nearly $12 billion maintenance backlog to-do list. In late November Interior Secretary David Bernhardt released the list of projects the first $1.3 billion will be spent on. Critical bridge repairs, or a new structure, for Yellowstone National Park, new maintenance facilities at Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and a new roof for the Mammoth Cave Hotel at Mammoth Cave National Park were among the dozens of deferred maintenance projects on the list.
As welcome as the funding package was, some warned that it shouldn't be viewed as the solution for the Park Service's maintenance situation.
"This is a Band-Aid. It's fine, it's good to get some money, an infusion of cash, to solve some of these problems, that's great," Margaret Walls, a senior fellow at Resources For the Future, told the Traveler in August. "But it doesn't really address the long-term problem, which, as you said, the deficit grows every year and they continue to add to this list of projects that need to be done.
"Unless you have a better ongoing funding situation for the parks, you're still going to run into this problem over time."
Construction of a border wall through Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument cost more than a few saguaros/NPCA, Kevin Dahl
Border Wall
As it was in 2019, the ongoing construction of a border wall along the U.S.-Mexico border through Arizona was a significant story for the park system. With the Department of Homeland Security having received a waiver from following "all legal requirements" in connection with the border wall's construction, there soon were concerns that the work was impacting sacred areas, unnecessarily destroying saguaro cactus and other vegetation in Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, contributing to the dropping water level at Quitobaquito Springs, and posing a threat to wildlife migrations.
While President-elect Biden is on record as opposing the wall and promising to stop further construction, the damage in Organ Pipe Cactus and Coronado National Memorial has been done.
Wild hogs are a problem in a number of national parks, including Great Smoky Mountains National Park/Courtesy of Bill Lea
Invasive Species
There was good, and bad, news on the invasive species front for the National Park System.
On the positive side, in August the Interior Department released its strategy for dealing with invasive species, such as Burmese pythons in Everglades National Park, Asian carp in the Great Lakes region, feral hogs in Great Smoky Mountains National Park, and quagga mussels in Western lakes managed by the Park Service, and even feral cats at Cape Hatteras National Seashore.
The draft plan the Trump administration came up with emphasizes interagency coordination, cost-effective control, science based practices and decision-making. It also allows for regional flexibility, asking the department to work with governors and other stakeholders.
Seeing that the plan succeeds is critical.
"The Department of the Interior has estimated that not even 1 percent of invasive plant populations are considered 'under control' on DOI lands, and the number for invasive animal populations is not much better – around 10 percent are likely under control," Dr. Melissa Abdo, the Sun Coast regional director for the National Parks Conservation Association, told Traveler in August. "As climate change is now adding complexity to the massive challenge of preventing, detecting, and eradicating invasive species, we are keen to see science-based efforts ramped up in order to tamp down the threat that invasive species pose to our natural heritage.”
More evidence of the problem arose in August, when a non-native northern snakehead (Channa argus) was caught in the Upper Delaware Scenic and Recreational River near Callicoon, New York. Park staff said this was of great concern because these fish are predators that potentially threaten important native species and recreational fisheries in the Delaware River. These fish are native to Asia but have been showing up with increasing frequency in other parts of the world recently.
Good news for wildlife in the National Park System in 2020 included the return of wolverines to Mount Rainier National Park/NPS
Wildlife Issues
Invasive wildlife species are only one aspect of the wildlife issues confronting the National Park Service.
Last spring the Park Service, under orders from the Interior Department, moved to relax its hunting and trapping prohibitions in national preserves in Alaska so they would align with the state's regulations. While then-acting National Park Service Director David Vela said the new regulations "will support the (Interior) Department's interest in advancing wildlife conservation goals and objectives, and in ensuring the state of Alaska’s proper management of hunting and trapping in our national preserves," National Parks Conservation Association President Theresa Pierno said the adopted regulations would not only harm bears and other wildlife but also deprive visitors of seeing some of these animals in the wild.
Under the rule changes, hunters on national preserves could:
- Use bait (donuts, grease-soaked bread, etc.) to hunt bears;
- Use of artificial light to spotlight dens to kill black bears; and
- Kill bear cubs or sows with cubs.
- Take wolves and coyotes (including pups) during the denning season (between May 1 and August 9)
- Take swimming caribou
- Take caribou from motorboats under power
- Take black bears over bait
- Use dogs to hunt black bears
Elsewhere, a move by Secretary Bernhardt to halt work to help recover grizzly bears in the North Cascades Ecosystem was quickly criticized as placing politics over science,
For more than two decades, biologists have been working to recover the North Cascades' grizzlies, a threatened species. And while more than a few reports of grizzly sightings in the ecosystem that stretches north to Canada are received by state and federal officials each year, most turn out to be black bears.
Bernhardt, though, shut down the effort after visiting with local residents. "The Trump administration is committed to being a good neighbor, and the people who live and work in north central Washington have made their voices clear that they do not want grizzly bears reintroduced into the North Cascades," the secretary said.
Grizzly bears also were the topic in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem in 2020, when the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a a lower court's decision that blocked the U.S. Fisn and Wildlife Service from removing the species from Endangered Species Act protections.
The 9th Circuit's decision upheld the lower court's finding that the Fish and Wildlife Service in 2017 had not used sound science in judging that the Yellowstone grizzlies were not threatened by a loss of genetic diversity. It also ruled that the agency must determine whether delisting the Yellowstone population would have any impact on grizzly populations elsewhere, and must commit to a "recalibration" method that won't skew future estimates of the species' population in the ecosystem.
In positive wildlife news in 2020, a female wolverine and her two kits were confirmed to be roaming Mount Rainier National Park. Another wolverine, a male, also has been spotted in the park recently, but the discovery of the female with kits was hailed as evidence that the park once again can be a breeding ground for the species.
Mangrove forests that protect places such as Biscayne, Everglades, and Virgin Islands national parks could be gone by 2050 because of sea-level rise/NPS, G. Gardner
Climate Change
Sea-level rise and more potent storms continued to make news in the National Park System in 2020, whether it was seen in the seemingly annual overwash problems with North Carolina 12 that runs the length of Cape Hatteras National Seashore, concerns that the phenomena could wipe out sea turtle nesting habitat, or how rising waters affect bird nesting success in and around Everglades National Park.
Mangrove trees serve as nature's hurricane barriers for places such as Everglades National Park, Biscayne National Park, Virgin Islands National Park, and Big Cypress National Preserve. Plus, they provide valuable habitat for fish and other marine life, and are pretty cool for humans who are fortunate enough to paddle through them. But they could be gone by 2050, victims of sea level rise driven by climate change.
Scientists studying sediment data from the last 10,000 years are estimating that current projections for sea level rise will doom mangroves if they come true.
Climate change also is impacting national parks far from the coasts. In a two-part series early in the year, Traveler pointed out the problems climate change and invasive species are creating for Canyonlands National Park and Glen Canyon National Recreation Area in Utah.
Climate change's impacts also are affecting how some park superintendents assess their park's needs. Climate change is expected to infuse more unpredictability in annual precipitation for the West Texas region than for just about anywhere else in North America.
At Big Bend National Park, how to ensure water will flow when a faucet is turned is key for visitation and human safety. So along with designing a new pipeline, Big Bend's management team needed to factor in how climate change will affect Oak Spring, as its flow largely is dictated by that water which falls from the sky.
Crowding The Parks
This also is a perennial issue for the National Park Service, but only at a relative handful of parks when you realize there are more than 420 units in the park system. But for Zion, Arches, Acadia, Rocky Mountain, Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Mount Rainier, Glacier, and Yellowstone national parks, it's a serious issue that so far has eluded solutions.
Acadia National Park in Maine might be the scout in terms of searching for solutions, as it tested a reservation system this past fall, one that is scheduled to become the norm in 2021. In short, "visitors to Acadia National Park will need a vehicle reservation to drive up the Cadillac Summit Road during sunrise and daylight hours for the 2021 summer season," the park announced in November.
"Vehicle reservations will not be required for the Sand Beach Entrance corridor in 2021, however. While this popular two-mile stretch of the Park Loop Road was included in an 18-day pilot of the reservation system last October, further implementation and planning has been postponed for this area, as well as Jordan Pond," park staff added. "Factors contributing to next steps include the availability of the fare-free Island Explorer bus system, which was sidelined due to COVID-19 for all of 2020, as well as a number of significant safety, staffing, infrastructure, and connectivity concerns."
Both Rocky Mountain and Yosemite relied on reservation systems this past year to manage visitors in the face of the Covid-19 pandemic, though they are not expected to use them in 2021 if the virus is under control.
Zion National Park in Utah continues to struggle with crowding. Park staff this year, in dealing with Covid-19, closed the Zion Canyon Scenic Drive whenever all the parking spots were filled; that often led to the drive closing to newcomers by 9 a.m. The park managers have been working for years to come up with a permanent approach to managing crowds, but have not yet settled on any one solution.
At Glacier National Park, which has been trying to solve congestion on the Going-to-the-Sun Road for years, expanded shuttle bus operations, a few more hiking trails, and more parking are among the improvements staff lately have been talking about in their work to manage the iconic corridor that cuts east-west across the mountainous park.
The East Troublesome Fire burned deep into Rocky Mountain National Park in 2020/NPS
Wildfires
This past year saw tremendous and deadly wildfires in California, though for the National Park Service as a whole the flames largely avoided parks. A key exception, though, was Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado, where the Cameron Peak fire on the northwestern edge of the park and the East Troublesome fire on the western border made serious incursions into the park and led to the largest one-year burn in the park's history.
Combined, those two fires blackened nearly 30,000 acres of Rocky Mountain. The East Troublesome fire, which destroyed the Grand Lake Entrance Station, made a run deep into the park, which closed on October 22 due to the danger.
California wildfires also closed Sequoia, Kings Canyon, and Point Reyes National Seashore, while parts of Yosemite and Whiskeytown National Recreation Area were closed by nearby flames. Mojave National Preserve witnessed a devastating fire in August that covered more than 43,000 acres -- and burned through a magnificent Joshua tree forest -- before it was put out.
The changing nature of wildfires during climate change has National Park Service officials and firefighters adapting their techniques to fire prevention, but it likely won't be an overnight success.
Climate change has literally exploded the views of wildfire on the land. The years since the historic conflagration that swept Yellowstone National Park in 1988 have brought drought, higher-than-normal temperatures, and disease to many national park forests, making them particularly vulnerable to a lightning strike, an abandoned campfire, or even a chain pitching sparks as it's dragged down the road behind a vehicle.
Fires at elevations that in the past would have been doused by fall snowstorms are not just starting in the fall but burning deep into the season, as the East Troublesome and Cameron Peak fires at Rocky Mountain National Park demonstrated.
"We have been set up due to fire suppression and increasing temperatures and a number of other factors, like the wildland urban interface (WUI), of the past 50-100 years to a situation now that may take us decades to resolve,” Crater Lake National Park Superintendent Craig Ackerman told the Traveler.
The wildfire threat isn't isolated, either, as climate change has the "overwhelming majority of parks ... already at the extreme warm edge of historical conditions," according to researchers. Literally adding fuel to the high temperatures are forests that not only are tinder dry and cluttered with vegetative litter, but which evolved to burn.
"It’s an all or nothing type forest stand," Mike Lewelling, the fire management officer at Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado, told Traveler. "Mother Nature created lodgepole to all burn at the same time."
Nate Benson, the National Interagency Fire Cache's (Acting) branch chief of wildland fire, agreed.
"The one thing we’ve learned, we can put fires out, but at some point the conditions become such that the fires will do what they want to do," he said. "We have a certain level of success. Even under extreme conditions we still have success. Fires will start and burn. But the landscape is a highly burnable landscape under certain conditions."
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