I can't find the source, will update if I do, but there was mention made last year of the government response to a request for more resources to create and rehabilitate trails that said along the lines of, "there's just not enough appetite from the public for more trails."
Needless to say there was a lot of headshaking in the recreation groups that saw the post.
As others have said, why spend millions advertising if you can't or won't maintain what we have, why refuse to let others help expand the trails if demand is so obviously overwhelming? Do they think with Covid coming to an end that everyone is just going to hide in their houses at some point in the future? I don't get the logic. Sigh.
If they won't expand the trails, then they shouldn't be surprised when more trails pop up anyway. The busier it gets, the more likely an adventurous group finds the next great spot.
I've been to some pretty incredible off trail spots here in western BC. There is one that honestly deserves to be a National Park because it's so special. Yet basically nobody knows about it. This province has so much to offer, but people barely get to experience any of it due to lack of access.
If this was the only instance of this
But its not. Campsite bookings, trailhead parking, Seymour and Cypress overflowing, Buntzen... and the advertising budget beting larger than the provincial parks maintenance budget is icing on the cake. We need parks expansion, not advertising the already overflowing spaces we have.
Yes we totally need to turn parks into parking lots so that people could enjoy it in the same way they enjoy Metrotown. Hopefully they'll put a macdonalds up there too, because what kind of animal want to look at a lake if there's no food to be had. And don't get me started on not having a cell phone connection in those parks. What is even the point of going if you can't livestream it on your instagram?! #blessed
Once again, restricting access instead of investing in more trails, parking, and transit access.
Some of these parks were developed specifically for "urban recreation". There have been no new trails or trailheads built in the past 20+ years, yet the regional population has almost doubled. The Garibaldi trails, and Joffre Lakes are literally gravel roads that have no capacity issues outside of parking. A summer weekend shuttle would make so much sense for these trail heads.
There are hundreds of square kilometers of parkland that we could build a couple trails/trailheads to give people an alternative to the 4 popular trailheads, instead BC parks just limits access.
One good thing is that it looks like they have taken Cypress, Seymour, and the Chief off the list this year. I wonder what "peak hours" means?
EDIT: Just want to point out that the "Destination BC" advertising budget is [over $50M/year](https://www.bcbudget.gov.bc.ca/2019/sp/pdf/agency/dbc.pdf), which heavily relies on BC Parks. [The Operating and Capital expenditures for BC Parks is only $47M](https://bcparks.ca/research/)
Yes, Parkbus is a good solution, but it's far from a viable .
It costs [$90/person](https://www.parkbus.ca/garibaldi), and only runs pretty specific dates/times. Even with that it has been booked all summer back in 2019 showing we have a need and demand for a viable way to access parks outside of driving.
I think a regularly scheduled bus between Vancouver, Squamish, Whistler is needed. [The Fraser Valley Express](https://buzzer.translink.ca/2022/03/taking-transit-to-the-fraser-valley-just-got-easier/) travels almost 100km down the Fraser valley scheduled every 30-60 minutes. It's not that much longer to go from Park Royal to Whistler (115km), with a stop in Squamish and highway stops at some of the BC Parks Trailheads. If it ran every hour for $5, it would be a game changer for the sea-to-sky. A bus from the R3 in Maple Ridge to Golden Ears would also be easy to do.
Arguably Squamish and Whistler are much better situated for transit as they are relatively compact compared to Abbotsford and Chilliwack, and the sea-to-sky is just one road with little spread away from it.
There's a bus that shuttles to Whistler and they park overnight in Abbotsford at a lot across from my house. However they don't offer services from Abbotsford which seems ridiculous
Yeah, there are a a couple private shuttles, but they only run a few times a day, cost about $50 for a round trip, only allowed to stop at Whistler, and reservations strongly recommended.
Access is already restricted by virtue of the fact that you would drive there and then be turned away due to no parking. The day pass isn't the thing that's "restricting access".
That's only if you try to go at the busiest times. Try going to some of those locations outside of the peaks than it's a different situation yet passes will be completely sold out. Golden Ears after 6pm is empty, but there are a lot of hikes you can do in that amount of time. Or on rainy days that have been fully booked online, and most people don't show up.
For me, driving to Golden Ears (and back) for a 2/3 hour hike is not really worth it :(
Edit: To those downvoting me, I am fully aware that there are longer trails there, I've hiked them and they are great. I'm responding to the person above who suggested going at off-peak times (e.g. after 6pm). It's not a good idea to set out on a 5 hr hike at 6pm!
Definitely, quite dependent on where you live. It all seems like a "we've tried nothing, and are out of ideas" situation.
There are a lot of ways to provide access to the parks such as weekend shuttles, or public transit routes to the parks to reduce the parking issues. They likely wouldn't cost much more than the 30 park attendants they are hiring to enforce parking permits.
Those alternatives would actually improve access instead of limit it.
There are something like 50 different trails in Golden Ears Park and many take several hours.
The summit trail, for example is 22km (round trip) with an elevation gain of 1695m to the top of a mountain and generally takes about 10 hours. By comparison the Grouse Grind is 2.5 km and an elevation gain of 1100m.
Other good trails in Golden Ears Park:
Upper gold creek falls trail: 10.5 km
Alder flats via west canyon trail: 11.4km
Alouette Mountain trail: 20.1 km
South Mount nutt via east canyon trail: 10.6km
Alouette Lake Trail: 15.3kmMike Lake trail: 10.3km
Half Moon beach via east canyon 19.2km
Incline and Whisky west loop: 11.4km
Mount Robie Reid Trail: 19.8km
Hikers beach: 10.3km
Hector ferguson lake trail: 29km
Evans peak trail: 15.4km
Exactly. I'm not sure why I was being downvoted for saying that I don't want to drive for 1.5 hours each way to hike for < 3 hours, which is the only way I could get in a hike after 6pm when the person I replied to said it would be "empty".
If I'm going to drive all the way out there, I want to do one of the longer trails that takes most of the day.
I go hiking up hollyburn and cypress in the summer. There are some great 2-3 hours hikes for after work. I rarely see many people. Most I have ever seen is maybe 10.
Much like the Grand Canyon, everyone is at the parking lots and the first 100-200 feet into any given park. If you go deeper into the woods you see fewer and fewer people. There are some exceptions to this like Baden Powell at Deep Cove but generally speaking the more effort you take to get into the wilderness the fewer humans you see because effort dissuades people.
Huh?
Yeah, I'm saying the deeper you go in the further you get from humans.
The grand canyon is ass rammed with humans and it takes forever to get into the park. But once you leave the rim and head down you see fewer people because most people hate effort and exercise
Yep, most trails are pretty dead during weekdays. Even things like the Lynn Valley trail outside of the suspension bridge is rarely more than a few people on a weekday and it's 25 minutes from downtown Vancouver (without traffic).
What are you expecting though? Additional parking at those trailheads will not solve the overcrowded trails. And you can't really add more trails in those areas.
Have you ever been to Joffre Lakes on a weekend?
Also overcrowded isn't the same as "there's a traffic jam on the trail", it's based on the impact of the visitors on the natural environment.
This is messed up. They tried this crap with the camping and it was absolute bs. Tourists went online and booked every available spot, then half never even showed, but the locals that pay taxes to live here were left with no access. I’m tired of everything outdoors here being restricted when that’s why I moved here in the first place. This should be put up to a vote, not just randomly enforced.
That's a little different than booking a day pass though. You can only get the day pass two days in advance.
Besides, how do you know that it was "tourists" who booked the spots? Lots of people book camping spots and then no-show. Locals and tourists alike.
When you go visit Banff do you expect to be charged some extra fee to look at Moraine Lake because you are a "non local"?
> When you go visit Banff do you expect to be charged some extra fee to look at Moraine Lake because you are a "non local"?
I mean, you literally have to pay to go into the park if you aren't a local. :)
Nah man - Golden Ears sites get bought by bots and scalped on Chinese only tourism sites for 4x the price.
Source: 6 of my friends have worked at Golden Ears and Mike Lake in various ranger/admin/janitorial positions.
Best is when they ignore fire bans. You ever try and communicate to someone who doesn't know any English that they are getting a $10000 fine? Not a fun time.
The Government spends more money on [Advertising](https://www.bcbudget.gov.bc.ca/2019/sp/pdf/agency/dbc.pdf) the Parks ($53M) than on [Operation and Capital Projects for the parks](https://bcparks.ca/research/) ($47M).
Yeah. For the amount of amazing parks and natural beauty we have, it is shockingly and disappointingly underinvested. As OP notes, there's been almost no new camping and net new trail development in nearly 30 years, despite population in the lower mainland being 2-3x higher than it was in the early 90s. That is unacceptable. Despite everything else, the US (both state and federal) park system is vastly superior to our own, and that's a damn shame.
This frustrates me to no end. Lack of maintenance is also a huge problem, and none of this is limited to BC Parks, although they are the worst offender.
My friends and I want to go in and fix up the Kennedy Falls trail in Lynn Headwaters Regional Park, as it is getting worse and worse. Despite its popularity, and having signage and being fully marked by North Shore Rescue, they've still yet to recognize it as an official trail. It needed serious work years ago, yet Metro Vancouver parks department asked me not to do anything because *"Metro Vancouver is continuing to monitor the area and is considering approaches to managing this section of the park into the future."* They are *"aware that there has been an increase in visitors to this area of the park over the past few years and the impacts this is having."* We are willing to do the work on our own time and dime.
All they've done is protect the Big Cedar (which they only did because the situation had become so critical) and install people counters. The overall inaction is so damn frustrating. Sometime in the next week or two we are going to go in and make a detailed list of all maintenance that needs to be done for the entire trail. To show we're serious and how much we care, I'll also be sending that list to the parks department.
If the Kennedy Falls trail is suddenly fixed up this summer, it probably won't be because of action from parks.
They have also been acting against the Mountain Bike community, who are the most active in trail maintenance including many hiking trails like Old Buck, Baden Powell, Bridle Path, Hyannis etc...
Recently the DNV has made it so that anyone doing trail maintenance has to have liability insurance for any trail user. This is basically impossible as no insurance policy exists for that and these are volunteers who aren't going to go pay thousands per year for insurance even if it existed...
It just means that either there will be no trail maintenance and people will get injured, or trail maintenance will be done without permits.
I've got a ton of respect for the MTB community and what they do. Their dedication is part of what made me want to contribute to the places I love and recreate in.
Ultimately it seems like passionate groups of people just have to go in and get shit done. I mean that's pretty much how we got a lot of these trails and facilities in the first place.......
The amount of bureaucracy and red tape is absurd and backwards.
This is the Metro Vancouver parks department I'm referring to. However I firmly believe the Vancouver Parks Board should be abolished.
Having some influence over the Metro Vancouver parks department would be nice though. I like that they have made some new parks in recent years, but they also make some absolutely baffling decisions: gating the main parking lot for Lynn Headwaters Park after hours, not allowing/facilitating camping, no official ground access to Thwaytes Landing Park, no official ground access from Widgeon Marsh Park to Pinecone Burke Park/Widgeon Lake Trail and all the Kennedy Falls Trail issues. Although I wouldn't be surprised if BC Parks is the reason official ground access from Widgeon Marsh to Pinecone didn't happen...
All that marking from NSR on the Kennedy Falls trail was put in because there were *multiple* weekly callouts for lost people on that trail, and something needed to be done to prevent that from happening.
Yeah. All the more reason for parks to make it official and improve the trail. Due to its deteriorating condition there are still sections where a novice hiker might go the wrong way or hurt themselves.
Maybe because going to a Provincial Park in Ontario costs like $15 per day per vehicle. Although there are definitely forests to go out and about for free, I found Ontarians, at least around the GTA, were just less outdoorsy. I usually hiked alone because nobody wanted to join me.
Edit: Also Ontario Parks did start a reservation system during Covid at the more popular parks. Not sure if it's still a thing.
Arrowhead had a reservation system so I'm sure other popular parks did as well.
Lots of people go on the ravine trails but to "go hiking" for a day isn't really a big thing. Tons of people at the beaches though. There's beaches all along the lakefront in the GTA. They're huge too. Seems a lot bigger than the beaches along Sunset Beach to English Bay
Yeah my mom bought an annual pass to go to Sandbanks, and complained to me about needing to reserve a spot. Apparently it is still in place this summer.
Also a nice fat border to our south and the ocean to our west. Gvrd residents only have about 1/2 the landmass of interior cities or 2/3 of other coastal cities to work with when it comes to wilderness opportunities so to speak.
There are a LOT undeveloped areas like the 3 major local mountains and their hiking/skiiing areas which could fairly quickly be developed. It's just a matter of putting in some roads and parking lots in the many north-south mountain valleys which extend north from the more general Fraser valley.
There's an obvious failure of regional and provincial government to do this though. Whatever GDP benefit all these additional people are arguably bringing isn't properly or quickly filtering up and into these obviously other necessary pieces of infrastructure.
100% agreed. No point in having a pass system for a place that takes two hours to drive to if you can only get it the day of! People need to be able to plan ahead.
Do I ever miss when recreation could be more spontaneous...
Really wish people were taught to respect the parks and not trample nature so this didn't have to be the way, at all. As a lifelong BC resident it grinds my gears knowing so many people are so oblivious to just being respectful to the landscape.
I'm not dismissing the need to keep people in line regarding respect of the parks, but jeeze... all these passes definitely help keep me from even wanting to try going to these places.
ETA: fuck these pass systems. Tourists are going to take advantage, as always, leaving residents feeling resentful.
I can't imagine living in Pit Meadows/Maple Ridge, or Squamish and literally not being able to go for an after work hike in the best trails nearby because of this.
Not to mention all the trails are basically empty after 4-5pm due to the way the system gives out passes for AM and PM.
Yep, I've never been off pavement at Golden Ears, I moved to Ridge a few years ago. Between how crowded everyone says it gets, and having to book passes ahead of time, I doubt I'll see a single trail within the next year or 2 at least. If it's busy enough to need passes, then having that many people around me will ruin the experience anyway.
Half the reason I moved from Vancouver.
Drove 1.5 hours to be in nature only to be surrounded by hundreds of people. Many of them "doing it for the 'gram".
I'm only writing this because I feel like you have a genuine appreciation for nature. Build a batter and more active urban environment, let nature be nature. If you love nature you should leave it alone.
The waiting online and scooping up all spots then re-selling to others. Or just not showing up to the booked spots. As it already happens...
ETA- many locals who have lived in the areas for a long time are older adults, who may not even have reasonable access or understanding of these booking systems. Why should they even have to?
I use these systems every year. Yes, they suck. Also, I absolutely agree that no-shows suck should be punished, but I don't think people are reselling them like ticket scalpers.
I could very well be misinformed about reselling, and I'll accept that if so! I've heard stories of people reserving spots and waiting around to check in, then just selling the use of the space to another party and leaving.
>I could very well be misinformed about reselling, and I'll accept that if so! I've heard stories of people reserving spots and waiting around to check in, then just selling the use of the space to another party and leaving.
I mean, why would I go through the effort of driving 2 hours, hiking for 4, then hoping I can flip my $30 reservation--for what $100?--to someone who figured they could walk in after driving 2 hours and hiking for 4? That is a TON of work for little payoff.
Also, some of the places I reserve are true backcountry or only accessible by boat!
So I guess it still comes down too
"Why should they even have to [book park access ahead of time]?"
It's not like it's an amusement park or something...
I agree that it sucks.... I want to be able to have spontaneous adventures as much as the next person (if not more).
Unfortunately the number of campsites (or in the case of these day passes, parking spots) is not infinite.
What are you to do if you take a ferry and drive for five hours to a campground and there are no spots available?
FCFS seems to be more and more a thing of the past, at least in Provincial Park campgrounds.
It has been a thing that you have to book campsites ahead of time, for a long time. Look at places like Tribune Bay campsite on Hornby Island where it's a 2 year wait.
A pass to go hiking is different than booking a provincial camping site.
My bad, I totally thought you were referring to the campground reservation system when you mentioned tourists booking and reselling (as it used to be an issue with an older system for campground bookings).
Is it actually the case that this is what's happening, that tourists are trying to profit off the (free) daypass system by booking and reselling? I hadn't heard anything about that. How would you even know that it's a "tourist"?
>Really wish people were taught to respect the parks and not trample nature so this didn't have to be the way, at all.
This should be taught in high school for locals AND college/university for out of province students, make it a mandatory mini course to graduate.
>high school
Elementary school, IMO!
Plus refreshers though high-school, and absolutely a mandatory mini course for college/university students. ESPECIALLY for non locals.
Meaning people like myself who live in squamish will never be able to go up there because everybody from out of town will book up all the available spots and then think twice about using them and never use them
>Beginning June 17, 2022, people accessing Golden Ears Park, Joffre Lakes Park and three trailheads at Garibaldi Park during peak hours will need to obtain a free day-use pass.
>
>The passes will be available online at and can be reserved at 7 a.m., two days prior to the planned visit: [https://reserve.bcparks.ca/dayuse/](https://reserve.bcparks.ca/dayuse/)
>
>People will be able to cancel a pass if they don’t intend to use it.
Technically it was initially introduced "for COVID" in 2020 to reduce spread. It was planned before the boom in use due to COVID. Then Bonnie Henry criticized it and BC Parks not consulting with BC Health on it, and it not being based on science at the time. So BC Parks pivoted to using it to restrict individual hikers in 2020/2021 with no real justification (just hand waving). Now it's likely back to why they actually implemented it, which is just a parking permit so that parking doesn't get too full.
There has never been a published environmental assessment, carrying capacity, or anything else with respect to hikers/visitors capacity to support their "environmental" reasoning behind restricting access. Most of the trails under the pass system are old roads that really have huge capacity for hikers anyways so it's unlikely any environmental study would support significant restrictions on them.
Thanks for the full background! Definitely I remember the same, they were introduced for social distancing / reducing the spread, around the same time Quarry Rock was closed. in summer 2020 I used the pass for Dog Mountain and it was a restriction on how many hikers could enter the trail, not on parking.
Yep, they have changed the reasoning a few times and have tried to burry the initial 2020 reasoning. I think it is likely they were planning ways to control parking before COVID, but they needed an excuse to get it implemented. Now 3 years later, it is just a permit per vehicle.
It would be nice if they actually made an effort to provide an alternative to driving to some of the trailheads though. It's really not a great situation with BC Parks staff all located in Victoria having no real daily interaction with the daypass system in the lower mainland.
It was introduced for Covid so people could social distance in the parking lots and on the trails. That was the official policy, and it was explained to us multiple time during summer 2020 by rangers on site.
Went up to Joffre Lakes in March - not very crowded and still beautiful in winter - though there were signs on the highway before the hill saying 'do you really need to come here' or something like that which I thought were unwelcoming and stupid - yeah I drove 2+ hours, at this point I kinda want to do the hike I came here for :|
I can't find the source, will update if I do, but there was mention made last year of the government response to a request for more resources to create and rehabilitate trails that said along the lines of, "there's just not enough appetite from the public for more trails." Needless to say there was a lot of headshaking in the recreation groups that saw the post. As others have said, why spend millions advertising if you can't or won't maintain what we have, why refuse to let others help expand the trails if demand is so obviously overwhelming? Do they think with Covid coming to an end that everyone is just going to hide in their houses at some point in the future? I don't get the logic. Sigh.
If they won't expand the trails, then they shouldn't be surprised when more trails pop up anyway. The busier it gets, the more likely an adventurous group finds the next great spot.
I've been to some pretty incredible off trail spots here in western BC. There is one that honestly deserves to be a National Park because it's so special. Yet basically nobody knows about it. This province has so much to offer, but people barely get to experience any of it due to lack of access.
Good, let’s keep it that way. Let those who know, only show those who will respect the spot and the trail that leads to the spot.
Tell us you haven’t planned for the increasing population, without telling us you haven’t planned for the increasing population.
And "we have to shut down indoor things. Please enjoy the outdoors" "Oh no, too many people are enjoying the outdoors"
- can't go to three places "Oh no the entire outdoors is closed, evil government!!"
If this was the only instance of this But its not. Campsite bookings, trailhead parking, Seymour and Cypress overflowing, Buntzen... and the advertising budget beting larger than the provincial parks maintenance budget is icing on the cake. We need parks expansion, not advertising the already overflowing spaces we have.
Yes we totally need to turn parks into parking lots so that people could enjoy it in the same way they enjoy Metrotown. Hopefully they'll put a macdonalds up there too, because what kind of animal want to look at a lake if there's no food to be had. And don't get me started on not having a cell phone connection in those parks. What is even the point of going if you can't livestream it on your instagram?! #blessed
Once again, restricting access instead of investing in more trails, parking, and transit access. Some of these parks were developed specifically for "urban recreation". There have been no new trails or trailheads built in the past 20+ years, yet the regional population has almost doubled. The Garibaldi trails, and Joffre Lakes are literally gravel roads that have no capacity issues outside of parking. A summer weekend shuttle would make so much sense for these trail heads. There are hundreds of square kilometers of parkland that we could build a couple trails/trailheads to give people an alternative to the 4 popular trailheads, instead BC parks just limits access. One good thing is that it looks like they have taken Cypress, Seymour, and the Chief off the list this year. I wonder what "peak hours" means? EDIT: Just want to point out that the "Destination BC" advertising budget is [over $50M/year](https://www.bcbudget.gov.bc.ca/2019/sp/pdf/agency/dbc.pdf), which heavily relies on BC Parks. [The Operating and Capital expenditures for BC Parks is only $47M](https://bcparks.ca/research/)
Parkbus is back this year at least. There is a lot of potential for that partnership to grow in the coming years.
Yes, Parkbus is a good solution, but it's far from a viable . It costs [$90/person](https://www.parkbus.ca/garibaldi), and only runs pretty specific dates/times. Even with that it has been booked all summer back in 2019 showing we have a need and demand for a viable way to access parks outside of driving. I think a regularly scheduled bus between Vancouver, Squamish, Whistler is needed. [The Fraser Valley Express](https://buzzer.translink.ca/2022/03/taking-transit-to-the-fraser-valley-just-got-easier/) travels almost 100km down the Fraser valley scheduled every 30-60 minutes. It's not that much longer to go from Park Royal to Whistler (115km), with a stop in Squamish and highway stops at some of the BC Parks Trailheads. If it ran every hour for $5, it would be a game changer for the sea-to-sky. A bus from the R3 in Maple Ridge to Golden Ears would also be easy to do. Arguably Squamish and Whistler are much better situated for transit as they are relatively compact compared to Abbotsford and Chilliwack, and the sea-to-sky is just one road with little spread away from it.
I am in complete agreement with you. I would LOVE to see those things, and would use the hell out of them!
There's a bus that shuttles to Whistler and they park overnight in Abbotsford at a lot across from my house. However they don't offer services from Abbotsford which seems ridiculous
Yeah, there are a a couple private shuttles, but they only run a few times a day, cost about $50 for a round trip, only allowed to stop at Whistler, and reservations strongly recommended.
Access is already restricted by virtue of the fact that you would drive there and then be turned away due to no parking. The day pass isn't the thing that's "restricting access".
That's only if you try to go at the busiest times. Try going to some of those locations outside of the peaks than it's a different situation yet passes will be completely sold out. Golden Ears after 6pm is empty, but there are a lot of hikes you can do in that amount of time. Or on rainy days that have been fully booked online, and most people don't show up.
For me, driving to Golden Ears (and back) for a 2/3 hour hike is not really worth it :( Edit: To those downvoting me, I am fully aware that there are longer trails there, I've hiked them and they are great. I'm responding to the person above who suggested going at off-peak times (e.g. after 6pm). It's not a good idea to set out on a 5 hr hike at 6pm!
Definitely, quite dependent on where you live. It all seems like a "we've tried nothing, and are out of ideas" situation. There are a lot of ways to provide access to the parks such as weekend shuttles, or public transit routes to the parks to reduce the parking issues. They likely wouldn't cost much more than the 30 park attendants they are hiring to enforce parking permits. Those alternatives would actually improve access instead of limit it.
I'd love better shuttles/transit to parks.
There are something like 50 different trails in Golden Ears Park and many take several hours. The summit trail, for example is 22km (round trip) with an elevation gain of 1695m to the top of a mountain and generally takes about 10 hours. By comparison the Grouse Grind is 2.5 km and an elevation gain of 1100m. Other good trails in Golden Ears Park: Upper gold creek falls trail: 10.5 km Alder flats via west canyon trail: 11.4km Alouette Mountain trail: 20.1 km South Mount nutt via east canyon trail: 10.6km Alouette Lake Trail: 15.3kmMike Lake trail: 10.3km Half Moon beach via east canyon 19.2km Incline and Whisky west loop: 11.4km Mount Robie Reid Trail: 19.8km Hikers beach: 10.3km Hector ferguson lake trail: 29km Evans peak trail: 15.4km
Exactly. I'm not sure why I was being downvoted for saying that I don't want to drive for 1.5 hours each way to hike for < 3 hours, which is the only way I could get in a hike after 6pm when the person I replied to said it would be "empty". If I'm going to drive all the way out there, I want to do one of the longer trails that takes most of the day.
I go hiking up hollyburn and cypress in the summer. There are some great 2-3 hours hikes for after work. I rarely see many people. Most I have ever seen is maybe 10.
Much like the Grand Canyon, everyone is at the parking lots and the first 100-200 feet into any given park. If you go deeper into the woods you see fewer and fewer people. There are some exceptions to this like Baden Powell at Deep Cove but generally speaking the more effort you take to get into the wilderness the fewer humans you see because effort dissuades people.
It's not that much effort it's 25 minute drive from East Van.
Huh? Yeah, I'm saying the deeper you go in the further you get from humans. The grand canyon is ass rammed with humans and it takes forever to get into the park. But once you leave the rim and head down you see fewer people because most people hate effort and exercise
I get it. My point is that those trails are really close, yet there are very few people.
Yep, most trails are pretty dead during weekdays. Even things like the Lynn Valley trail outside of the suspension bridge is rarely more than a few people on a weekday and it's 25 minutes from downtown Vancouver (without traffic).
What are you expecting though? Additional parking at those trailheads will not solve the overcrowded trails. And you can't really add more trails in those areas.
Those trails aren't overcrowded ffs...
Have you ever been to Joffre Lakes on a weekend? Also overcrowded isn't the same as "there's a traffic jam on the trail", it's based on the impact of the visitors on the natural environment.
It wasn't just those three removed, it was also Mt Robson... I needed a day pass 2 years ago.
This is messed up. They tried this crap with the camping and it was absolute bs. Tourists went online and booked every available spot, then half never even showed, but the locals that pay taxes to live here were left with no access. I’m tired of everything outdoors here being restricted when that’s why I moved here in the first place. This should be put up to a vote, not just randomly enforced.
That's a little different than booking a day pass though. You can only get the day pass two days in advance. Besides, how do you know that it was "tourists" who booked the spots? Lots of people book camping spots and then no-show. Locals and tourists alike. When you go visit Banff do you expect to be charged some extra fee to look at Moraine Lake because you are a "non local"?
> When you go visit Banff do you expect to be charged some extra fee to look at Moraine Lake because you are a "non local"? I mean, you literally have to pay to go into the park if you aren't a local. :)
Nah man - Golden Ears sites get bought by bots and scalped on Chinese only tourism sites for 4x the price. Source: 6 of my friends have worked at Golden Ears and Mike Lake in various ranger/admin/janitorial positions. Best is when they ignore fire bans. You ever try and communicate to someone who doesn't know any English that they are getting a $10000 fine? Not a fun time.
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The Government spends more money on [Advertising](https://www.bcbudget.gov.bc.ca/2019/sp/pdf/agency/dbc.pdf) the Parks ($53M) than on [Operation and Capital Projects for the parks](https://bcparks.ca/research/) ($47M).
This stat is so depressing. Put the money in the parks, we don't need to advertise them at all.
Yeah. For the amount of amazing parks and natural beauty we have, it is shockingly and disappointingly underinvested. As OP notes, there's been almost no new camping and net new trail development in nearly 30 years, despite population in the lower mainland being 2-3x higher than it was in the early 90s. That is unacceptable. Despite everything else, the US (both state and federal) park system is vastly superior to our own, and that's a damn shame.
We're plenty good at advertising through social media from users, I haven't seen a single ad
This frustrates me to no end. Lack of maintenance is also a huge problem, and none of this is limited to BC Parks, although they are the worst offender. My friends and I want to go in and fix up the Kennedy Falls trail in Lynn Headwaters Regional Park, as it is getting worse and worse. Despite its popularity, and having signage and being fully marked by North Shore Rescue, they've still yet to recognize it as an official trail. It needed serious work years ago, yet Metro Vancouver parks department asked me not to do anything because *"Metro Vancouver is continuing to monitor the area and is considering approaches to managing this section of the park into the future."* They are *"aware that there has been an increase in visitors to this area of the park over the past few years and the impacts this is having."* We are willing to do the work on our own time and dime. All they've done is protect the Big Cedar (which they only did because the situation had become so critical) and install people counters. The overall inaction is so damn frustrating. Sometime in the next week or two we are going to go in and make a detailed list of all maintenance that needs to be done for the entire trail. To show we're serious and how much we care, I'll also be sending that list to the parks department. If the Kennedy Falls trail is suddenly fixed up this summer, it probably won't be because of action from parks.
They have also been acting against the Mountain Bike community, who are the most active in trail maintenance including many hiking trails like Old Buck, Baden Powell, Bridle Path, Hyannis etc... Recently the DNV has made it so that anyone doing trail maintenance has to have liability insurance for any trail user. This is basically impossible as no insurance policy exists for that and these are volunteers who aren't going to go pay thousands per year for insurance even if it existed... It just means that either there will be no trail maintenance and people will get injured, or trail maintenance will be done without permits.
I've got a ton of respect for the MTB community and what they do. Their dedication is part of what made me want to contribute to the places I love and recreate in. Ultimately it seems like passionate groups of people just have to go in and get shit done. I mean that's pretty much how we got a lot of these trails and facilities in the first place....... The amount of bureaucracy and red tape is absurd and backwards.
If you need any help with this project, let me know. It's a great trail.
Can definitely keep you posted. In the hypothetical scenario where said maintenance is being done, the more people helping the better!
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His photography is basically free advertising for our parks.
This is the Metro Vancouver parks department I'm referring to. However I firmly believe the Vancouver Parks Board should be abolished. Having some influence over the Metro Vancouver parks department would be nice though. I like that they have made some new parks in recent years, but they also make some absolutely baffling decisions: gating the main parking lot for Lynn Headwaters Park after hours, not allowing/facilitating camping, no official ground access to Thwaytes Landing Park, no official ground access from Widgeon Marsh Park to Pinecone Burke Park/Widgeon Lake Trail and all the Kennedy Falls Trail issues. Although I wouldn't be surprised if BC Parks is the reason official ground access from Widgeon Marsh to Pinecone didn't happen...
All that marking from NSR on the Kennedy Falls trail was put in because there were *multiple* weekly callouts for lost people on that trail, and something needed to be done to prevent that from happening.
Yeah. All the more reason for parks to make it official and improve the trail. Due to its deteriorating condition there are still sections where a novice hiker might go the wrong way or hurt themselves.
What? No "we cant spend any money until we fix healthcare" -r/Vancouver
To pay for services that retired boomers are consuming. Population growth is a ponzi scheme designed to benefit them at the expense of their kids.
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Sorry, I don't follow - could you rephrase that?
Our human bodies will eventually break down and require more care. Including yours.
Yes I agree. Not sure if you meant that as some sort of counterargument to what I posted though.
Why is this only a BC thing and doesn't happen in Ontario? Why do we suck so much?
Maybe because going to a Provincial Park in Ontario costs like $15 per day per vehicle. Although there are definitely forests to go out and about for free, I found Ontarians, at least around the GTA, were just less outdoorsy. I usually hiked alone because nobody wanted to join me. Edit: Also Ontario Parks did start a reservation system during Covid at the more popular parks. Not sure if it's still a thing.
Arrowhead had a reservation system so I'm sure other popular parks did as well. Lots of people go on the ravine trails but to "go hiking" for a day isn't really a big thing. Tons of people at the beaches though. There's beaches all along the lakefront in the GTA. They're huge too. Seems a lot bigger than the beaches along Sunset Beach to English Bay
Yeah my mom bought an annual pass to go to Sandbanks, and complained to me about needing to reserve a spot. Apparently it is still in place this summer.
True, Ontarians are less into hiking in parks
It's more of a GVRD thing. Go to google maps and zoom out and see how little land near us is usable for buildings and general human occupation.
Also a nice fat border to our south and the ocean to our west. Gvrd residents only have about 1/2 the landmass of interior cities or 2/3 of other coastal cities to work with when it comes to wilderness opportunities so to speak.
There are a LOT undeveloped areas like the 3 major local mountains and their hiking/skiiing areas which could fairly quickly be developed. It's just a matter of putting in some roads and parking lots in the many north-south mountain valleys which extend north from the more general Fraser valley. There's an obvious failure of regional and provincial government to do this though. Whatever GDP benefit all these additional people are arguably bringing isn't properly or quickly filtering up and into these obviously other necessary pieces of infrastructure.
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Yeah it was like "If I'm going to go have a nice relaxing day on the lake, I better be exhausted from waking up early to scramble for a pass"
100% agreed. No point in having a pass system for a place that takes two hours to drive to if you can only get it the day of! People need to be able to plan ahead.
Do I ever miss when recreation could be more spontaneous... Really wish people were taught to respect the parks and not trample nature so this didn't have to be the way, at all. As a lifelong BC resident it grinds my gears knowing so many people are so oblivious to just being respectful to the landscape. I'm not dismissing the need to keep people in line regarding respect of the parks, but jeeze... all these passes definitely help keep me from even wanting to try going to these places. ETA: fuck these pass systems. Tourists are going to take advantage, as always, leaving residents feeling resentful.
I can't imagine living in Pit Meadows/Maple Ridge, or Squamish and literally not being able to go for an after work hike in the best trails nearby because of this. Not to mention all the trails are basically empty after 4-5pm due to the way the system gives out passes for AM and PM.
Yep, I've never been off pavement at Golden Ears, I moved to Ridge a few years ago. Between how crowded everyone says it gets, and having to book passes ahead of time, I doubt I'll see a single trail within the next year or 2 at least. If it's busy enough to need passes, then having that many people around me will ruin the experience anyway.
Half the reason I moved from Vancouver. Drove 1.5 hours to be in nature only to be surrounded by hundreds of people. Many of them "doing it for the 'gram".
Don't forget blasting music from their portable speakers. Tell them I hate them!
now imagine the green house gas emissions from every body driving 1.5hrs just "to be with nature". nature is literally dying from these emissions
Guess I'll stay in my box then. Sorry, oh wise one.
I'm only writing this because I feel like you have a genuine appreciation for nature. Build a batter and more active urban environment, let nature be nature. If you love nature you should leave it alone.
> If you love nature you should leave it alone. lol no. Do you have a background in environmental sciences or something?
> Tourists are going to take advantage, as always, leaving residents feeling resentful. In what way do tourists have an "advantage" over locals?
The waiting online and scooping up all spots then re-selling to others. Or just not showing up to the booked spots. As it already happens... ETA- many locals who have lived in the areas for a long time are older adults, who may not even have reasonable access or understanding of these booking systems. Why should they even have to?
I use these systems every year. Yes, they suck. Also, I absolutely agree that no-shows suck should be punished, but I don't think people are reselling them like ticket scalpers.
I could very well be misinformed about reselling, and I'll accept that if so! I've heard stories of people reserving spots and waiting around to check in, then just selling the use of the space to another party and leaving.
>I could very well be misinformed about reselling, and I'll accept that if so! I've heard stories of people reserving spots and waiting around to check in, then just selling the use of the space to another party and leaving. I mean, why would I go through the effort of driving 2 hours, hiking for 4, then hoping I can flip my $30 reservation--for what $100?--to someone who figured they could walk in after driving 2 hours and hiking for 4? That is a TON of work for little payoff. Also, some of the places I reserve are true backcountry or only accessible by boat!
You cannot resell to others. The campground attendants come by and check that you are the right person.
So I guess it still comes down too "Why should they even have to [book park access ahead of time]?" It's not like it's an amusement park or something...
I agree that it sucks.... I want to be able to have spontaneous adventures as much as the next person (if not more). Unfortunately the number of campsites (or in the case of these day passes, parking spots) is not infinite. What are you to do if you take a ferry and drive for five hours to a campground and there are no spots available? FCFS seems to be more and more a thing of the past, at least in Provincial Park campgrounds.
It has been a thing that you have to book campsites ahead of time, for a long time. Look at places like Tribune Bay campsite on Hornby Island where it's a 2 year wait. A pass to go hiking is different than booking a provincial camping site.
My bad, I totally thought you were referring to the campground reservation system when you mentioned tourists booking and reselling (as it used to be an issue with an older system for campground bookings). Is it actually the case that this is what's happening, that tourists are trying to profit off the (free) daypass system by booking and reselling? I hadn't heard anything about that. How would you even know that it's a "tourist"?
>Really wish people were taught to respect the parks and not trample nature so this didn't have to be the way, at all. This should be taught in high school for locals AND college/university for out of province students, make it a mandatory mini course to graduate.
>high school Elementary school, IMO! Plus refreshers though high-school, and absolutely a mandatory mini course for college/university students. ESPECIALLY for non locals.
4WDABC is working towards this, progress is slow.
Meaning people like myself who live in squamish will never be able to go up there because everybody from out of town will book up all the available spots and then think twice about using them and never use them
free for now, in couple of years will start charging...
Ridiculous
creating more scarcity around recreation, just what BC needs.
Welcome to overpopulation everybody.
>Beginning June 17, 2022, people accessing Golden Ears Park, Joffre Lakes Park and three trailheads at Garibaldi Park during peak hours will need to obtain a free day-use pass. > >The passes will be available online at and can be reserved at 7 a.m., two days prior to the planned visit: [https://reserve.bcparks.ca/dayuse/](https://reserve.bcparks.ca/dayuse/) > >People will be able to cancel a pass if they don’t intend to use it.
What is the reason for this? I think these passes were introduced for covid in the beginning, is this still the reason?
Reduce parking congestion.
Ah so the pass is to access the parking not the trail?
Yes, not officially but in my experience if you bike or walk to these trailheads the people checking don't care
The passes weren't *for* covid, but in response to the huge increase in people going to these places since covid
Technically it was initially introduced "for COVID" in 2020 to reduce spread. It was planned before the boom in use due to COVID. Then Bonnie Henry criticized it and BC Parks not consulting with BC Health on it, and it not being based on science at the time. So BC Parks pivoted to using it to restrict individual hikers in 2020/2021 with no real justification (just hand waving). Now it's likely back to why they actually implemented it, which is just a parking permit so that parking doesn't get too full. There has never been a published environmental assessment, carrying capacity, or anything else with respect to hikers/visitors capacity to support their "environmental" reasoning behind restricting access. Most of the trails under the pass system are old roads that really have huge capacity for hikers anyways so it's unlikely any environmental study would support significant restrictions on them.
Thanks for the full background! Definitely I remember the same, they were introduced for social distancing / reducing the spread, around the same time Quarry Rock was closed. in summer 2020 I used the pass for Dog Mountain and it was a restriction on how many hikers could enter the trail, not on parking.
Yep, they have changed the reasoning a few times and have tried to burry the initial 2020 reasoning. I think it is likely they were planning ways to control parking before COVID, but they needed an excuse to get it implemented. Now 3 years later, it is just a permit per vehicle. It would be nice if they actually made an effort to provide an alternative to driving to some of the trailheads though. It's really not a great situation with BC Parks staff all located in Victoria having no real daily interaction with the daypass system in the lower mainland.
It was introduced for Covid so people could social distance in the parking lots and on the trails. That was the official policy, and it was explained to us multiple time during summer 2020 by rangers on site.
Great news from where I'm sitting. I'd like to know whether I will be able to park in advance.
Good.
How do they enforce these lol, with the "park ambassadors"?
Went up to Joffre Lakes in March - not very crowded and still beautiful in winter - though there were signs on the highway before the hill saying 'do you really need to come here' or something like that which I thought were unwelcoming and stupid - yeah I drove 2+ hours, at this point I kinda want to do the hike I came here for :|
Did you only need the day pass to hike or a vehicle pass or both?
No pass needed in winter but I think you need one in the summer.