Glacier National Park Records Third-Highest Visitation Through First Half of 2024
Nearly 550,000 visitors entered the park in June, sending year-to-date visitation up 4.3% over 2023
Glacier National Park hosted 549,591 visitors in June, a nearly 7% increase from the same month in 2023 and the fourth consecutive month of year-over-year visitation spikes. Park officials reported the swarm of early-summer tourists boosted the park’s year-to-date visitation 4.3% over last year. The strong early-season numbers for Glacier, which included a record amount of visitors in May, indicate annual visitation could exceed 3 million for the fourth time in the park’s 108-year history.
More than 858,544 people visited Glacier National Park during the first six months of the year, the third highest six-month tally ever, according to park records. The two years that saw even more visitors were 2017 — 884,900, en route to an all-time record of 3.3 million visitors — and 2021, when a post-pandemic surge in outdoor recreation sent more than 887,279 people to Glacier and saw the annual total exceed 3 million.
Across Glacier’s myriad entrances, the portals to the famed Going-to-the-Sun Road saw the majority of traffic. The Saint Mary entrance on the park’s east side saw 122,417 visitors last month, up 4.4% over last year, while the most popular West Entrance saw 244,058 visitors pass through the gate, a 9.5% increase over 2023 and the highest ever number of visitors for June.
The number of visitors is estimated based on vehicle counts including concession buses, which were also up in June with 498 buses carrying 7,142 passengers passing through the West Entrance.
Compared to 2023, visitation was up significantly at the Camas entrance, with a 39% jump, as well as at Many Glacier, with an 11.2% increase. Goat Lick and Walton, two stops within the park’s boundaries along U.S. Highway 2 saw an 18.6% decline, while the Polebridge entrance to the North Fork region of the park welcomed 16.5% fewer monthly visitors, though Polebridge is still running ahead of last year’s six-month total.
Glacier National Park is in the fourth consecutive year of requiring a vehicle reservation for park visitors. This year, the reservation requirement is in place for the North Fork, Many Glacier and the West Entrance of Going-to-the-Sun Road (GTTSR), a pilot program designed to shunt some congestion away from the park’s most popular areas. Removing vehicle reservation requirements from the Two Medicine area has led to increased traffic at that entrance during the first weeks of July, forcing park officials to impose temporary restrictions as parking lots reached capacity.
Interestingly, the latest park report shows that while the number of visitors to Glacier exceeds the totals for the first half of 2023, more visitors are just passing through. Just 87,068 visitors stayed overnight in the park, down 7.5% compared to 2023. The biggest decreases were among campers, with an 11.2% decrease in tent campers and a 13.2% decrease in group campers, followed by a 7.8% decrease in RV stays.
Visitation to Glacier peaks in July and August with around 1.4 million tourists passing through the entrance gates over the two months.
The National Park Service’s crown jewel isn’t the only unit in the region to see an uptick this year. Yellowstone National Park set an all-time record through June this year with 1.6 million visitors, 3% higher than during the park’s record-setting 2021.