CYANMAGENTAYELLOWBLACK 4H FINAL

4H THE PALM BEACH POST • SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 4, 2005

Shuttle systems are in the works at national parks

By STEVE HENDRIX
The Washington Post
As more people try to squeeze
more cars inside national park
boundaries, some of the most pop-
ular parks are planning new or ex-
panded shuttle systems similar to
the successful one at Zion in Utah.
Among park advocates, all eyes are
on the huge transportation bill cur-
rently moving through Congress;
many of these plans will live or die
based on what the appropriators
decide. Here are a few of the things
you may encounter now and on fu-
ture national park vacations:
Grand Canyon
What it has now: Between March
and November, certain roads along
the South Rim are closed to private
vehicles. You can still drive to the
developed areas at Grand Canyon
Village, but you must take one of
the free shuttle lines out to view
spots along the roads to Hermits
Rest, Yaki Point and Mather Point.
What it plans: A long-standing
plan for a light rail system to bring
people in from the gateway town of
Tusayan, Ariz., to the South Rim
got so far that some of the train sta-
tions have already been built. But
sticker shock may have derailed
that idea permanently, and now
Congress is strongly encouraging
planners to look instead at a
shuttle-bus system along the same
route.
Great Smoky Mountains
What it has now: There is free
trolley service between Gatlinburg,
Tenn., and the park entrance, with
limited stops within park bound-
aries.
What it plans: Peak season traffic
is legendary at this Tennessee
park, especially in the Cades Cove
area of historic Appalachian struc-
tures. There is an 11-mile, one-way
loop that, like the Zion of old, can
barely accommodate its 2 million
driving visitors a year. In the fall
leaf season, it can take up to five
hours to creep through. The Park
Service plans a free mandatory
shuttle, prohibiting private cars en-
tirely at the busiest times. Local op-
position is stiff, but Zion’s success
may be winning converts. Herb
Handly, executive vice president of
the Smoky Mountain Convention
& Visitors Bureau, was a shuttle
skeptic before he visited Zion. ‘‘I
went from looking at it negatively
to coming back and saying I wish
we had a system like that in our
community and in our national
park,’’ he said.
Acadia
What it has now: Maine’s Acadia
is one of the friendliest parks to
carless travelers. With a network of
eight bus routes connecting Bar
Harbor with the park attractions on
Mount Desert Island — including a
stop at the airport — it’s possible to
fly in for an Acadia visit with no
stop at the Hertz counter. The Is-
land Explorer shuttle system,
which runs as often as every 15
minutes on some routes between
June and October, is free and vol-
untary (you can still drive in and do
battle for limited parking within the
park).
What it plans: To expand some
routes and meet growing demand
(312,000 people rode the system
last year), Acadia plans to add eight
or 10 buses to the 17 it now runs. In
the long term, the park service
plans to build a new visitors center
on the mainland where day users
can park and board the shuttle.
Yosemite
What it has now: The park oper-
ates a limited voluntary, free shut-
tle system in the heavily developed
eastern third of Yosemite Valley,
and just took delivery of a fleet of
low-emission diesel-hybrid vehicles
to replace its fleet of older city bus-
es. A regionwide system, YARTS,
provides alternative transportation
between the park and local towns
for a per-passenger fee.
What it plans: The park’s current
master plan envisions a set of three
satellite parking areas on the west-
ern edge of the park, with Zionlike
shuttle transport into Yosemite Val-
ley. But stiff opposition from the
surrounding communities may
scuttle that project.
Grand Teton
What it has now: There’s no pub-
lic transportation system operating
at the park.
What it plans: The Park Service
is proposing a scheduled shuttle
system between the town of Jack-
son, Wyo., and park headquarters
and into major activity centers, in-
cluding Jenny Lake, Colter Bay,
Jackson Lake Lodge and Signal
Mountain. Jackson not only sup-
ports the plan but has offered mu-
nicipal space for shuttle facilities.
The park’s master plan also propos-
es a network of bicycle and walk-
ing paths along major roadways.

On Zion’s buses, we are commuters into the wild

> ZION from 1H
And now? ‘‘You should
go up and see,’’ Anderson
says, beaming.
There’s still a line of
morning sun creeping down
the red cliff face as I walk
out to the curb, where a big,
white bus waits to take me
on a tour through the future
of America’s national parks.
Day is still just shouldering
aside the cool canyon shad-
ows, but the large parking
lot behind the visitors center
is more than half full of cars.
A steady current of visi-
tors flows through the wide
plaza of the new $2.5 million
center, eddying around the
handsome timber kiosks,
where carefully crafted dis-
plays brief them on Zion’s at-
tractions and history. Two
kiosks are devoted to de-
scribing various half- and
full-day itineraries, and by
the time they reach the
covered-timber bus shelter
on the far side, most people
should have a good idea how
Zion works.
Zion, in southwest Utah,
is one of the Four Corner
parks, and tourists typically
add it to their circuit visits of
Grand Canyon, Bryce Can-
yon and Arches national
parks. Like those others, Zi-
on is defined by the dramatic
landforms carved by the
eons from the high desert
plateau, most notably the
tight and winding Zion Can-
yon. Its intimate grandeur —
a soaring corridor lined with
homey riverside clearings
and a variety of day trails —
drew almost 2.7 million folks
last year. That’s where the
shuttle goes.
At the white bus, I step
aside for an older couple to
make their way up the steps
— slow but serious hikers,
judging by the matching
Tilley hats, the Magellan
GPS unit and Komperdell
collapsible trekking poles.
‘‘Welcome to Zion Na-
tional Park and the Zion
shuttle,’’ says the driver, af-
ter we pull away with a hy-
draulic hiss. His spiel is car-
ried on speakers in our bus
and through the attached
trailer bus trundling behind
us. ‘‘The Zion shuttle is the
only access into the canyon
and the Zion Scenic Drive.
We’ll be making eight stops
on our way up-canyon.
You’re welcome to get off at
any stop, stay as long as you
like and get back on another
shuttle. Buses run every sev-
en minutes. If you were to
stay on the bus for the entire
loop, the trip up and back
will take about 90 minutes.
The last shuttle to the visi-
tors center departs the Tem-
ple of Sinawava at 11 p.m.
‘‘First stop, the Zion Hu-
man History Museum.’’
At first, though, we’re not
going anywhere. The shuttle
idles quietly for a good four
minutes near the park en-
trance as an unyielding
string of cars and RVs zips
by. Nothing surprising about
that. About 2,800 cars will
pour into the park on this
beautiful June day in south-
western Utah, bringing some
of the 2 million-plus visitors
that come to Zion each year.
Finally, we pull out and
join the pack heading along
Route 9. But after about a
mile, something profound
happens. Traffic forks right,
toward the Mount Carmel
Tunnel, and points east. The
shuttle bears left, into the
heart of Zion on a highway
that is utterly empty. It’s qui-
et, a two-lane drive all our
own.
Only shuttles are allowed in the Zion National Park in Utah. They run all day and visitors get off and on at
any stop. The park drew almost 2.7 million folks last year.
One site along the route in Zion is Weeping Rock, where the water
continuously seeping from it, has been dated to be 4,000 years old.
‘‘If you look to the left,
you’ll see the west temple,
the highest peak in Zion,’’
says the driver as we make
our way at a stately 21 mph.
‘‘The three peaks coming in-
to view on your left are Abra-
ham, Isaac and Jacob, the fa-
mous Court of the Patri-
archs.
‘‘Next stop, Court of the
Patriarchs. Please collect
your personal belongings.’’
We are commuters into
the wild. The schematic
route map on the wall of the
bus reads like an outdoors
version of subway stops:
Canyon Junction, Court of
the Patriarchs, Zion Lodge,
the Grotto, Weeping Rock,
Big Bend.
‘‘What’s our stop?’’ asks a
boy.
‘‘This one,’’ says his fa-
ther, Gene Marquis, a Navy
engineer from La Plata, Md.,
who’s here with his wife and
two sons during a two-week
western park swing. They
hadn’t heard about Zion’s
unique shuttle system before
showing up this morning. So
far, they’re loving it.
The Marquises scramble
off, along with several other
families, and I follow. The
shuttle is propane-powered,
and it pulls away with some-
thing less than a roar —
more like a soft grumble and
a whiff of outdoor grill. Not
another vehicle passes, and
an exquisite desert silence
fills the void, broken only by
the soft mariachi shake of
leaves from the cottonwoods
along the river.
I’ve visited Zion once be-
fore, in the summer of 1999,
and well remember the buzz-
kill crush we’d found on this
same route. We had hoped to
actually walk on one or more
of the trails, but it would
have been easier to find
parking in Georgetown on
New Year’s Eve than in any
of the small, jammed lots in
this canyon. Eventually, we
did what everyone else was
doing: double-parked on the
roadside, flattening a bit of
desert vegetation in the pro-
cess, and walked almost a
mile through traffic just to
get to a trailhead. Like many
national parks, Zion was be-
ing loved to death by drivers
like me. And short of ban-
ning cars from the most pop-
ular road in the park, it
seemed there was nothing to
be done.
But, amazingly enough in
this era of intractable prob-
lems, they did something.
Starting the very next year,
the Park Service launched a
radical pilot program that
has, by all accounts, trans-
formed the visitor’s experi-
Photos courtesy National Park Service
ence. From April through
October, the park actually
does ban private cars along
the 6-mile scenic route,
along with motorcycles, tour
buses and RVs. The only
way to the park’s most popu-
lar sites is by foot, bicycle or
one of these free shuttles
that run like clockwork from
5:35 a.m. to nearly midnight.
Visitors park in one of
the lots by the visitors center
or in the adjacent town of
Springdale, less than 2 miles
away. A second free shuttle
loop connects spots all along
Springdale’s main street with
the park, allowing visitors to
ride door-to-trail from their
hotels and making this vil-
lage of 500 Utah’s smallest
town with a full-scale mass
transit system.
In spite of some initial lo-
cal opposition to closing the
road in summer, both
Springdale and the Park Ser-
vice now consider the shut-
tle a boffo success. Visitation
hasn’t declined, and the park
reports that a whopping 98
percent of recorded com-
ments are favorable. Officials
from parks nationwide and
as far away as New Zealand
have come to see how they
got the cars out of Zion.
Under the gaze of the
‘‘Patriarchs,’’ the Marquises
and I stand at the silent road-
side, enjoying the phenome-
non of a dead-silent national
park on a glorious peak-
season morning.
‘‘It would be chaos if ev-
erybody drove back in here,’’
says Paula Marquis. ‘‘I guess
this is the way all the big
parks are going to go.’’
She might be right. Mass
transit is nothing new in na-
tional parks. According to
the National Parks Conserva-
tion Association, 96 units of
the park system operate
some kind of alternative to
the one-family/one-car mod-
el, from the ferryboats of San
Francisco’s Alcatraz, Michi-
gan’s Isle Royale and the
Statue of Liberty to the shut-
tle buses, vans and trolleys
in parks such as Denali and
Glacier Bay in Alaska. And
as more people try to wedge
more cars into the most pop-
ular parks, observers say
shuttle systems similar to Zi-
on’s will almost certainly be-
come more common.
‘‘You have to look at each
park individually, but every-
body thinks it’s going very
well at Zion,’’ says Gerry
Gaumer, a Park Service
spokesman. ‘‘It could be a
good model to follow.’’
‘‘Absolutely,’’ says Laura
Loomis of the NPCA. ‘‘A lot
of parks could benefit from a
If you go
Getting there: Las Vegas is
the closest major airport to Zi-
on National Park, leaving you
with a 150-mile drive to south-
western Utah (about 21⁄2 hours
at western highway speeds).
Where to stay: The only hotel
within the park is the Zion
Lodge, a lean but comfortable
compound spread along a
wide spot in the valley that’s
open year-round (888-297-
2757, www.zionlodge.com).
Some of the rooms are in two-
story hotel buildings, starting
at $133, some in quadplex
cabins, starting at $148. All
boast killer views of the can-
yon. The lodge itself consists
of a theater for ranger talks, a
dining room and lunch bar,
and a gift shop filled with the
Native American flute music
that is the Muzak of western
souvenir stores. There are
plenty of good hotels and mo-
tels in the gateway community
of Springdale, a mile from the
park entrance. The Best West-
ern Zion Park Inn (1215 Zion
Park Blvd., 800-934-7275,
www.zionparkinn.com) is a
clean and attractive option
system like this.’’
Acadia National Park in
Maine already has a volun-
tary shuttle, paid for in part
by L.L. Bean, that brings visi-
tors into the park from Bar
Harbor. The free service has
proven hugely popular, cut-
ting summer traffic conges-
tion and reducing park pollu-
tion by as much as shutting
down one power plant would
do, Loomis says. At Harpers
Ferry, W. Va., visitors leave
their cars at remote lots and
ride buses down into the
cramped little mountain
town. And shuttle systems
are on the planning boards of
several of the biggest and
most popular parks, includ-
ing Yosemite, Grand Can-
yon, Yellowstone, Grand
Teton and Great Smoky
Mountains.
Each of these parks faces
its own set of traffic prob-
lems, and none is likely to
get a Zionlike mandatory
shuttle along with a ban on
cars from the park’s interior,
even seasonally. But each
park still faces hard opposi-
tion from local businesses
and officials who fear Ameri-
cans won’t visit a park that
doesn’t welcome their cars,
as well.
‘‘They should come here
and see,’’ says Dean Cook,
general manager of the Best
Western Zion Park Inn in
Springdale, and president of
the Zion Canyon Visitors Bu-
reau. A shuttle stop sits right
in front of his motel, and a
group of his guests wait
there for the bus. The local
opposition largely vanished,
he says, once tourists em-
braced this new option so
heartily.
Back inside the park, I
hop on and off the shuttle
system like a Gray Line tour-
ist with an all-day pass. The
driver rattles on about the
surrounding geology: ‘‘The
Navajo sandstone is only 89
percent solid. The rest is wa-
ter that filters very slowly
through. The water continu-
ously seeping from Weeping
Rock has been dated to be
4,000 years old.
‘‘Next stop — Weeping
Rock.’’
I step off and climb up
the short trail to the mossy
with a pool and Zion shuttle
stop just outside the entrance.
Rooms in summer begin at
$105.
Where to eat: The outdoor pa-
tio of Zion Lodge’s Red Rock
Grill surprised me with its ex-
cellent dinner menu and fes-
tive cocktail offerings. The
breaded Navajo eggplant with
tomatillo and jack cheese
($12.95) came on a bed of
spinach with a sweet corn-
and-bean salsa. I had another
memorable outdoor meal
among the cliffs at the Bit and
Spur (1212 Zion Park Blvd.,
435-772-3498, www.
bitandspur.com) in Springdale.
The sweet potato-and-masa
tamales came recommended,
but I was glad to have my
head turned by the unlikely
special: spearfish tacos with a
mango chutney ($18.50). A
crazy thing to order in desert
Utah, I know, but they were
magnificent.
Information: Zion National
Park, 435-772-3256,
www.nps.gov/zion.
— Steve Hendrix
The Washington Post
overhang, where old, old wa-
ter drips out of the rock onto
my face. By the time I get
back to the road, another
shuttle is pulling up. It’s full,
and just after I squeeze into
the last seat, a young family
of six climbs up. The father
sees the crowd and looks as
if he might back down the
steps. But his littlest girl,
about 7, cries, ‘‘Oh boy, we
get to stand!’’ and on they
come.
They are the Arnell fami-
ly, from Camarillo, Calif.,
and in spite of not getting
seats every time, they’ve em-
braced shuttle life.
Eventually, I do follow
Ranger Anderson’s advice,
and get off at the Grotto stop
for the two-hour climb up to
Angels Landing. It’s a beauti-
ful scramble and a surpris-
ingly tricky one. ‘‘This is one
of our most strenuous
hikes,’’ the shuttle driver
had said. ‘‘It’s not for those
with a fear of heights.’’
But the payoff is worth it,
a sweeping north-south view
of a canyon that has taken
the breath of human visitors
since the days of the Paiute
Indians. Way down below,
the ribbon of highway lies
along the gray-green Virgin
River. It’s empty except for
two toy shuttles. They make
not a sound that travels this
high.
Two hours later, with a
hint of dusk in the air, I
climb back on the faithful
shuttle and ride one stop to
the Zion Lodge, an austere
but comfortable hotel spec-
tacularly situated between
high canyon walls. Guests at
the lodge are given a pass to
drive into Zion, but only to
unload their luggage and
park. Unlike my visit here
six years ago, when traffic
around the lodge looked like
a stadium parking lot after
the Super Bowl, it was now
as calm as an ancient glade.
On a clear evening like
this, with no backed-up traf-
fic, the outdoor patio of the
lodge’s Red Rock Grill may
be the most pleasant dining
room in the country. After a
fine (and not expensive)
meal of breaded eggplant
and tomatillo, I watch the
sun slide up the cliffs, giving
the canyon over to the night
once again.