...the U.S. park service faces a $12 billion maintenance backlog.
Adding more campgrounds in a National Park is almost impossible considering the current rules and regulations of the park service. It is even tough to trim trees in one.Isaac-1 said:Given the cost of everything else associated with visiting a national park, the current campground rates are trivial, what is not trivial is trying to get a reservation. If privatizing would mean updating the campgrounds, trimming trees lining the camping loops, and maybe even include adding more campgrounds, I would be all for it.
DouglasB12 said:Any time an idea like this comes up, the idea is to take a national resource and transfer as much money from it into the hands of a private business. These are *national* (or state) parks that are meant to be available for ALL Amerincans - not to be used as a means to extract as much money as possible from campers and place in the hands of private individuals.
HARD PASS on the idea of privatizing!!!!
I'll take that bet.Arch Hoagland said:I've got a $10 bill that says no one on the committee ever camped a day in their life.
I bolded the part of your comment I feel strongly about Gary. If we didn?t have a senior pass, we would buy an annual entry pass for $80 a year, just like we did for the numerous years we were under 62. If we didn?t have a discount on camping inside the park, we would pay the (still inexpensive) fee to camp. But I have an acquaintance who went nuts and threatened a reporter for the Salt Lake Tribune who wrote about getting rid of the discount. He was virulent enough that he got a police visit. This guy has a decent retirement income and travels both domestically and internationally plus has some expensive hobbies. But ask him to pay the same fee a family with kids has to pay? Heresy!Gary RV_Wizard said:The Senior discount is a terrific perq for seniors but probably un-affordable to the parks. If we can afford to buy recreational vehicles, it's hard to claim that we seniors couldn't afford to use the parks without a huge discount. I think it is unconscionable for seniors to complain about the lack of services and improvements in parks, yet insist that their 50% discount is inviolable. Seniors ought to be willing to pony up more to support parks, maybe reducing the discount to 20% on camping fees and keeping the 50% only for general admission fees. But then I look at the tax give-aways for the super-wealthy and wonder why seniors can't get some extra breaks too