Zinke tours Glacier, talks alternatives to reservation system

Following up on his previous criticisms of Glacier National Park’s reservation system, Congressman Ryan Zinke on Friday during a visit to the park pushed for an improved shuttle service while saying he is working with Glacier officials to find ways to mitigate challenges like access for locals.

Zinke and members of the House Appropriations Committee made several stops throughout Northwest Montana last week to better understand local transportation and housing needs. Along with committee vice chairman Tom Cole from Oklahoma and Rep. Juan Ciscomani from Arizona, Zinke toured the North McDonald Bridge construction site with his staff.

Before the tour, Zinke and his party met with Glacier Superintendent Dave Roemer to discuss construction and future infrastructure projects, as well as the park’s ticketed reservation system. Earlier this year, Zinke voiced skepticism of the reservation system, including how it was impacting visitor experience and access for locals into the park.

When asked during a press junket about his plans to mitigate, he said he is working with park officials to protect the experience and legacy of the park without locking locals out.

“We’re meeting to look at transportation systems, you know for the long-term … probably a transportation system, not a bus system, but something cool where people want to get on for that experience,” Zinke said.

Zinke said that since most visitors to Glacier National Park don’t wander far from their vehicle, he believes the park can “do a better job of opening up that experience.” He said a short-term goal would be to improve their current shuttle service and find better funding avenues. A long-term vision isn’t formulated yet, but he said they will be looking at a large transportation system potentially along the lines of what is offered with Glacier’s historic red bus tours.

“There’s 18 national parks that have a bus system — a transportation system. So you know, as Congress, one of the things is power of the purse, right? You’ll look at what the requirements are based on a study, alternatives to a reservation system so people have access, but the right kind of access, and no doubt a transportation system is part of that,” Zinke said.

He said the transportation and housing issues facing Glacier can be found in other national parks, so he is also looking at larger scale solutions.

This past spring, Zinke called for the removal of the park’s reservation system and later held a community meeting to hear from local business owners. He expressed at the April meeting that he wanted to see access before the 6 a.m. reservation window, ending reservations at 1 p.m. rather than 3 p.m., and removing the reservation requirement for the east entrance of the Going-to-the-Sun Road.

While the park went on to allow visitors to enter before 6 a.m., reservations are still required on the east side and the reservation window still ends at 3 p.m. Park officials say the reservation system has improved visitor experience. In a letter obtained by the Daily Inter Lake, Roemer addresses concerns made by Great Falls International Airport Director John Faulkner. The letter was also sent to Sens. Jon Tester and Steve Daines, as well as Zinke. In the letter, Roemer said their 2023 pilot reservation system is an attempt to balance their objectives of providing a positive visitor experience, long-term park resource protection and socioeconomic benefits to the local community. He said the decision to extend the reservation system to other areas of the park this summer, including Two Medicine and Many Glacier, were prompted by safety issues and impacts to visitor experience.

“Vehicle congestion caused unplanned closures in these valleys 79 times in 2022 (57 at Many Glacier and 22 at Two Medicine.) Closures were implemented when parking — including informal parking alongside roads that increase resource damage and pose a risk to visitor safety — became full and were lifted when spaces opened,” Roemer wrote in the letter.

He said these closures typically lasted two to three hours, which inconveniences visitors and impacts local businesses who “have a shared interest in providing accurate information and excellent service to area visitors.” Similar issues were experienced during the 2021 season in the North Fork area of the park, and after implementing a reservation system there in 2022, they only had eight unplanned closures compared to the previous year’s 87.

In the letter, Roemer admits tickets often sell out quickly and the reservation system is more complicated than showing up and only paying for park admittance, but that it’s an improvement compared to the alternative.

“However, this is a trade-off against an unmanaged system where visitors may arrive to find overcrowded park roads and parking, or possibly find a temporary closure due to unsafe congestion,” Roemer said.

Zinke also expressed wanting to better accommodate the east side of the park. He and the House committee members visited Browning on Thursday for various meetings with local officials. He said “the east side is struggling” during Friday’s press junket, adding that the Museum of the Plains Indians could use an upgrade and they are “looking at how we can integrate that into a bigger system.”

“And housing — the other thing we talk about is we need housing for the employees. So, where are we going to put that? Maybe doing a joint operation with the Bureau of Reclamation, Forest Service property, there’s a lot of ways of looking at the housing. Because one, you have to have a great park and two, you have to have great people to run the park,” Zinke said.

In addition to meeting with tribal law enforcement about youth and the opioid crisis, Zinke met with Blackfeet Tribal Housing on Thursday.

On Sunday, the group toured construction at Glacier Park International Airport and met with local stakeholders for a roundtable discussion about transportation and housing challenges due to fast-paced growth of the Flathead.