Page 10 - Flathead Beacon // 1.14.15

10 | JANUARY 14, 2015 NEWS
FLATHEADBEACON.COM
Sunset in Glacier National Park.
GREG LINDSTROM FLATHEAD BEACON
Glacier Park Attendance Record Settles at 2.33 Million
Facts
FIGURES
Numbers in the news
$60 billion
Estimated cost over a decade to provide millions of students with two years of free community college tuition, a new proposed initiative by President Barack Obama.
2.95 million
Jobs created in the U.S. in 2014, the best annual employment growth since 1999.
2.8 million
Long-term unemployed Americans who have been jobless for 27 weeks or longer, 1.1 million fewer than a year ago but still above historical averages.
1.7%
Average hourly wage increase in the U.S. in 2014, barely ahead of inflation.
Annual total broke the previous all-time mark of 2.22 million set in 1983 and was a 6.7 percent increase over 2013
By DILLON TABISH of the Beacon
With 2014 officially in the books, the fi-
nal numbers have been tallied for Glacier National Park’s milestone year.
An estimated 2,337,719 people visited the Crown Jewel of the Continent in the last 12 months, according to the National Park Service Public Use Statistics Office.
The annual total broke the previous all-time record of 2.22 million set in 1983 and was a 6.7 percent increase over 2013.
It marked the sixth time in the last eight years that visitation surpassed 2 million.
The year-end totals show 1.07 mil- lion people entered the park through the West Entrance, a 6.6 percent increase over 2013. There were 484,500 people at Saint Mary’s, a 2.9 percent decrease over last year. Many Glacier attracted the third most visitors, 300,767, a 9.4 percent in- crease over 2013.
There were fewer overnight stays in the park in 2014. A total of 364,476 camp- ers stayed overnight, a 4 percent decrease. The number of RV campers — 104,379 — dropped 6.8 percent. Concession lodg- ing stays dipped 7.8 percent, with 117,074 people. There were 110,584 tent campers, roughly the same as a year ago. A total of 29,869 people camped in the backcountry, a 1.7 percent increase.
It appears to have been a banner year
overall for the National Park System. An estimated 294 million people visited na- tional parks last year, a new record and 20 million more than in 2013, according to early estimates.
At Yellowstone National Park, over 3.51 million people visited, marking the eighth year in a row over the 3-million mark. Visitation was up 10 percent from the previous year and was the second highest on record.
Park officials at Glacier have been studying the trend of ballooning visita- tion, hoping to craft a management strat- egy for the bustling western core. In June, the NPS began reviewing nearly 400 pub- lic comments and a draft plan with several alternative proposals, including potential changes to the park’s free shuttle system, will be released this spring.
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