Recreation.gov and managing demand for popular reservations

I recently tried to cancel 3 reservations and Rec.gov would not allow me to do so. And spent an hour tryin. I  really really really HATE Rec.gov

My reaction after getting multiple error messages trying to grab a permit for a popular route at the exact time they became available:

“This is messed up. They made it too convenient and now everyone wants to go backpacking. I miss the old days when things worked.”

My reaction after getting the same sought-after permit the following day:

“Wow. This is amazing and only took a few clicks from home. And it keeps the riff raff out of the backcountry.”

So basically, it’s a love-hate relationship.

I’m somewhere in the middle.  Now that I’ve used the system for quite a few years, l can manage it really well   I wish the search engine for campgrounds would allow you to search by availability, date, and location, but it doesn’t. You have to start the availability window each time you select a campground

For backpacking, Robert’s experience is too often the case. But I blame that on too many people making “just in case” reservations. They often don’t end up using them, and just take the $10 fee loss as a cost of doing business.  The same thing happens in campgrounds.

Id be in favor of tweaks to the system that prevented people from making multiple reservations for the same dates, and penalties for people who make reservations and then don’t show up.

Far too often, I’ve arrived at a campground that rec.gov days is fully booked, only to find 30% of the sites reserved but unoccupied.

The same might be true if wilderness permits, but since you have to collect most permits in person, I suspect that those who don’t show up have their permits added back into the walk-up pool.

We tend to start hikes middle of the week, and have never had a problem getting a walk-up permit for two people.

I’m pretty sure you cannot reserve multiple reservations on the same day.

I am guilty of making multiple reservations to account for whether I want to take a trip earlier or later in the season. I do release my unused reservations and I try to do that weeks ahead of time. I have noticed they always get gobbled up quickly so I’m pretty sure they are getting used.

Don’t worry too much about un-used reservations, increase the number of allowed reservations to compensate for this

The regulating agency can look at how busy a trailhead actually is and increase or decrease the number of allowed reservations if it’s not crowded or too crowded.

I always release any reservations I make if I’m not going to use them to allow others to use them

Don’t worry too much about un-used reservations, increase the number of allowed reservations to compensate for this

That would probably work for back country trail reservations with dispersed camping, where the max number of users is more of a fuzzy number than anything.

But rec.gov also serves front country car camping sites as well as designated sites in the back country.   I think “over booking” wouldn’t work as well in those circumstances.  I’ve had the same experience as Paul:  front country campgrounds that are fully booked online but only have about 70% occupancy, because people don’t cancel their unused reservations.

Coming up with a meaningful way to automatically release unclaimed camp spots would also be really difficult.  What if I’m driving from 8 hours away and got a late start, stuck in traffic, flat tire, etc .  When I roll into the campground at 10:00PM, should I still expect to have my reserved campsite?  I hope so.

Maybe if the system had more intelligence and tracked each user’s habits.  Suppose every year I book 30 reservations but only actually use 10 of them and just leave the other 20 go unused.  What if the system could track the fact that I never checked in for those 20 reservations and started giving me a “bad karma” score on my rec.gov account? Could the system then impose penalties for my bad behavior?

yeah, over booking doesn’t work for campsites

I was at a campground and the camp host said they don’t worry about reserved but not used sites.  The site is paid for so didn’t make any difference to him.  I think he thought it was less work so not a problem.  Oblivious to the idea that there are people unable to find a place to camp.

The least they could do is release the site the next day if no on shows up.  For multi day reservations.

I was car camping on the CA coast this weekend, sites managed through Recreation.gov. Every other site was empty despite “Campground Full” signs and no open reservations showing online.

Once upon a time a family (mine) could jump in the car for extended road trips across our park system without worrying about an itinerary. That would be nearly impossible now without the ability to go “off grid”, so to speak.

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Oh, and myself and a few other members here discovered a new development the hard way last season…We were in person at the Eastern Sierra Interagency Visitor Center in Lone Pine and found out that “walk up” permits were in fact only being issued online. “Walk up” seems to imply a warm body standing in front of a counter, but no…Apparently “walk up” now means those permits go back into the online pool at Recreation.gov at a set time on the given day and can only be accessed that way.

Used to be you could walk up to the counter at a given time and ask for a Shepherd’s Pass entry. No? OK, how about Baxter? No. Okay, how about Taboose?….and just go down the list without issue.

Three of us nearly lost our minds trying to navigate this absolutely nonsensical system they had in place. Timing out due to spotty internet connections, availabilities disappearing before our eyes…all the while standing in front of the employees in the Visitor’s Center. Praying this has changed since last summer?

Absolutely agree, Jerry.  I am so saddened by the way people abuse this system.

The GCNP Backcountry office on the South Rim still does actual in-person walk-up permits.  Out an abundancy of caution, I foolishly did their advance reservations in November for my January trip (which you have to fax in – WTH has a fax machine anymore?!?) despite being told some years ago, “After Christmas break, for January and February, just walk-up – no one comes to backpack except Canadians and Alaskans.” and it turned out we could have gotten any trail-corridor camp sites we wanted at the last minute and therefore considered the recent snow and weather forecast in our itinerary.

I understand the complaint, “When I was a kid, we could just. . . . ” but the US population has grown faster than we’ve added parks and I observe backcountry users aren’t only middle-class whites anymore.  That democratization of our public parks seems like a good thing although recent immigrants and the less affluent are still very underrepresented.

That democratization of our public parks seems like a good thing although recent immigrants and the less affluent are still very underrepresented.

I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to see how the current system actually favors the affluent above all else.

Agree with Dave T.  The population of the US in 1970 was 200 million.  It’s now 340 million, and a lot more people have discovered outdoor recreation within the last decade.

There’s a nice local practice of setting stuff too good to throw away to the side at the dump and transfer stations and within minutes someone else snags it.  It helps me toss stuff I’ll never use, knowing someone else will.

Similarly, most of our recent public-use (USFS, US Wildlife Refuge) cabins we’ve used, my wife found a week or day before on a (not sure if it’s FB or something else) page called something like “Alaska Public Cabin Reuse”.  People throw up reservations they can’t use and ask for their original purchase price.  I suppose one could get scammed, but you’d have your Venmo transaction record and in a small-population state, bad karma would loop back pretty quickly.

Craig:  Absolutely.  Whether by intent or not, most systems favor the affluent.  I can afford to make multiple reservations, I won’t miss the reservation fee if I don’t use it (although I’d feel bad about preventing someone else’s use which, for handgun hunters, could be considered Glock-blocking), and I can sit at work and have a reservation page open on one of my screens.

I get the population use issues, but choices are made in how to handle them. One choice that has clearly been made is to favor the online/credit card user over the flesh and blood standing at a campground or permit office with cash in hand.

Craig: “favor the online/credit card” – in many realms.  So many pandemic responses are never going away because they save agency personnel time and budgets (at the expense of customer service).  No cash bridge or toll pike fares, for instance.  I’ve got a smart phone and can pay online (and if I lived there, would just get a FastPass).  Lacking that, one would accrue fares, late fees, and citations just to get to work.

^Exactly David. COVID restrictions created this increased need for the online/digital/faceless transaction…and it seems like it’s here for good as people now shift into using it as an excuse to save on personnel and budgets. I was amazed how little could be done for me in-person at the permit office in Lone Pine. It wasn’t the employee’s fault, it was that he was literally locked out of this new online system. If I had a question I couldn’t even ask him…had to call a separate customer service number for that.

“I get the population use issues,…”

Yeah.  But sometimes it seems like they use the increase of population just as a rhetorical argument to support their policy

If a trailhead parking is overflowing and people parked all over at dangerous spots, or boxing in other cars, then that’s a problem that needs fixing – reservations may be reasonable

If a backpacking location is overflowing and people are camping where they’re damaging wild areas, then that’s a problem that needs fixing – just have camping in designated sites only.  Make more designated sites at nearby locations.  Publicize areas that are high use so people can plan on going to other areas if they want solitude.

The government agencies should treat us like customers.  They should encourage us to use public land.

Not treat us like a nuisance to discourage.

Just my opinion.

As someone who does a lot of trailwork in the national forests in California, I am happy to treat the public like customers—if only they would treat the forest like a treasured resource.  When they assume that the rules apply to everyone but themselves, when they fail to observe even the basic premises of LNT, and when they are offended by anyone who suggests they are somehow affecting use by the rest of us, I can easily see why they are treated a nuisances to discourage.

I’ve have plenty of the latter, and after two or three events in the same day, it takes a conscious effort to maintain my friendly and welcoming attitude!