Privatize the National Parks?

Travis

Misanthrope of the Mountains
Travis
Joined
Mar 31, 2007
Messages
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The idea was brought up in this thread. So what do you think of it? Could The Grand Canyon use a roller coaster or two to bring in more people? What if it would make way more money for the owners to just throw a dam across Yosemite Valley? And those Giant Sequoia, surely they are worth a bundle for their lumber.

I'm just not sure I think that selling off our National Parks to commercial interests is wise. Maybe the most popular ones could be kept in decent condition on account that they are already so visited (though I doubt programs like the Yellowstone Wolf reintroduction would continue). Though they'll become much more expensive to visit.

But what of the smaller National Parks? Would they just become housing developments or some other type of new use?
 
Travis said:
The idea was brought up in this thread. So what do you think of it? Could The Grand Canyon use a roller coaster or two to bring in more people? What if it would make way more money for the owners to just throw a dam across Yosemite Valley? And those Giant Sequoia, surely they are worth a bundle for their lumber.

I'm just not sure I think that selling off our National Parks to commercial interests is wise. Maybe the most popular ones could be kept in decent condition on account that they are already so visited (though I doubt programs like the Yellowstone Wolf reintroduction would continue). Though they'll become much more expensive to visit.

But what of the smaller National Parks? Would they just become housing developments or some other type of new use?
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Yabbut once you privatise the national parks, you change the audience. The people who used to go may not want the commercialised version, but you instead attract those who get excited by a Disney interpretation of nature. The economics of this would be interesting... in a morbid kind of way.

Maybe if some other country bought the parks and paid a bucketload of taxes on the revenue generated, it would help? Selling the land for housing estates or the redwoods for nice firewood tends to be a one-time benefit, but I guess you could always charge a fee for every time somebody wants to take a photo of El Capitan.
 
I don't advocate municipally owned protected lands from being turned over to the private sector. I don't think though, that you should be so quick to trust the government's judgment regarding their management either.

Regardless of who does control the interest of these lands, it is impossible to make everyone happy.
 
I find myself arguing for the present situation of federal ownership that contracts most day to day operational services to private companies.

The long term need of preservation is probably not best served by private ownership.

The short term need for economy and efficiency is met by the current policy of contracting services with private companies like Xanterra Corp.

I don't see any financial benefit to privatization, and we would almost certainly lose the current obligation to preserve the parks for future generations.

An imperfect example of privatization exists today with tribal ownership of parts of the Grand Canyon. The Hulapai (pronounced wall-ah-pie) tribe runs something called a skywalk - a transparent bridge that extends over the edge. It is not really going all that well for them. Also, the canyon is actually scattered with the remains of abandoned private operations like mines and tramways. Private endeavors fail a lot, and often with the public left to pick up the cleanup costs.
 
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The main reason most of these places were put into the system was to preserve something that commercial interests would have destroyed.

The ownership must remain with the federal government and use restricted to that which best preserves the scenic and ecological features of the locations. They were never intended to turn a profit.

Increased fees may be the only way to save the parks. Or a tax credit could be given for donations to foundations formed specificly to preserve the parks. Let the corporate swine in and they will start demanding further concessions in order to "stay afloat."
 
It's a small point, but Lefty's post caused me to think of it:

Our worst forest fires have happened because we did not do maintenance on the natural detritus that accrues in them. Yes, nature does take care of this problem itself, through fire.

This is beneficial to the forest, but harmful to us and our property. Small, controlled burns, done frequently so that literal heaps of bonfire material don't build up, are generally recommended. The massive Yellowstone fire was actually quite beneficial to the forest, but was also quite harmful to many of the animals, not to mention the park structures and people.

If parks were privatized, could we expect them to handle this important aspect of forestry maintenance?

EDIT to add:

Wiki said:
Some researchers, as well as some timber companies and private citizens, understood that fire was a natural state of affairs in many ecosystems. Fire would help clean out the understory and dead plant matter, allowing economically important tree species to grow with less competition for nutrients. Native Americans would often burn woodlands to reduce overgrowth and increase grasslands for large prey animals such as bison and elk.[10] As early as 1924, environmentalist Aldo Leopold argued that wildfires were beneficial to ecosystems, and were necessary for the natural propagation of numerous tree and plant species. Over the next 40 years, increasing numbers of foresters and ecologists concurred about the benefits of wildfire to ecosystems. In 1963, a group of ecologists consulted by the National Park Service released a report recommending that wildfires should be allowed to periodically burn to restore the environmental balance in parks. The Wilderness Act of 1964 helped to address the role of fire as a natural part of ecosystems.[4] By 1968, the National Park Service had adjusted its fire management policies to reflect changing attitudes. The service determined that fires that started naturally (by lightning) would be permitted to burn if they posed little risk to human life and property. The service also decreed that under prescribed conditions, controlled burns would be deliberately set to restore balance to ecosystems.[6] Fire ecology became better understood after many forests had aged to maturity and were overdue for a large scale burn.
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Errr, nobody in that other thread suggested that ownership of the parks would be turned over to a private business, just that the operations would be privatized. A hotel chain running the lodges at Yellowstone for example.

It certainly doesn't mean "roller coasters at the Grand Canyon".
 
WildCat said:
Errr, nobody in that other thread suggested that ownership of the parks would be turned over to a private business, just that the operations would be privatized. A hotel chain running the lodges at Yellowstone for example.

It certainly doesn't mean "roller coasters at the Grand Canyon".
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A private company(s) already does run the hotels, and other concessions, in Yellowstone and other parks, monuments and units of the National Park System. Depending on what services are considered necessary in a particular park, the concessions might include food, gas, lodging of various different types, guided rafting trips, guided horseback trips, packing, etc. The government is not doing all those things; they are managing the concessions.

There has been a great deal of controversy in the past over the amount of $$ these concessions pay (or don't pay) to the NPS for their concession contracts. In the big parks, they've raked in the big bucks while paying a paltry fee in the past.

As far as privatizing the national parks and associated units, I think it's a bad idea and at odds with the Mission Statement in the 1916 Organic Act: "To conserve the scenery, and the natural and biological processes and the wildlife therein; and to provide for the enjoyment of the same, in such manner and by such means as to leave them unimpaired for future generations." There's also been a lot of controversy over that statement, and which part of it should be emphasized as there's some obvious conflict in there, but the most recent interpretation emphasizes the conservation aspect, using good science.

That being said, the parks & monuments have not been particularly well managed in the past. They are extremely political; political appointees run many of the larger units and the Secretary of the Interior and Director of the NPS are political appointees. The NPS has functioned on the premise that the rangers are "paid in sunsets" and if someone gets sick of living in a remote area in substandard housing for which they're paying through the nose, well, there's someone else eager to take their place. Lately that hasn't been the case; people aren't willing to give up high-speed internet, TV, cell phone service, etc., to work for a government agency. Morale among park staff has consistently been among the lowest in the federal agencies (I can probably find those studies if anyone is interested), park law enforcement rangers have been the most frequently assaulted of all federal officers (I can also find that cite) and good science has often taken a back seat to political expediency.

That doesn't mean that private companies would necessarily run the parks any better. But the current system leaves a lot to be desired, and that's why the idea of privatizing them isn't simply dismissed as ridiculous and keeps on coming back up.

There's a public site called www.nationalparkstraveler.com that keeps pretty good tabs on what's going on in the NPS, including some of the controversies (also see www.honestchief.com).

By the way, there are 396 units of the national park system; only 50 of them are called "parks". All of them, however, are managed under the same system and controlled by the same set of regulations, and many of the monuments, etc. are just as spectacular as some of the parks.
 
Tiktaalik said:
The NPS has functioned on the premise that the rangers are "paid in sunsets" and if someone gets sick of living in a remote area in substandard housing for which they're paying through the nose, well, there's someone else eager to take their place.
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There was a running gag on the TV comedy cop show Reno 911 where a park ranger going stir-crazy living in an isolated area would call 911 to report non-existent crimes, just so the cops would come out and he would have human interaction.
 
Tiktaalik said:
That being said, the parks & monuments have not been particularly well managed in the past.
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In the late 50s and early 60s my family (parents and siblings) took many camping trips throughout the northern and mid-continent states. We stayed in both public (state-operated) and private campgrounds, but our preference was always for the public ones, which we found to be better designed, more spacious, cleaner, and more natural. I wasn't paying the bills at the time but if I recall correctly they were also cheaper.

Things may well have changed since then, but if so I would hazard a guess that it has something to do with the chronic underfunding of most public services in the past few decades. Anyway, my point is that just because public parks and monuments have not been well-managed in the (recent) past doesn't mean it has to be that way, or that the private sector will necessarily do better.
 
How about a huge advertisement for the next Michael Bay movie right across Half Dome?
 
Travis said:
But what of the smaller National Parks? Would they just become housing developments or some other type of new use?
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Why would they? Having something privately managed does not mean giving them free reign to do whatever the hell they feel like. Just have the land privately owned but still restricted use and publicly accessible. Allow them to add some amenities like hotels and carparks and to charge admission, but don't allow obviously stupid things like roller coasters. You'd probably want some regulation of prices as well.

It may still not be a great idea, but I don't see any reason to assume such obviously ridiculous outcomes as you describe.
 
Cuddles said:
Why would they? Having something privately managed does not mean giving them free reign to do whatever the hell they feel like. Just have the land privately owned but still restricted use and publicly accessible. Allow them to add some amenities like hotels and carparks and to charge admission, but don't allow obviously stupid things like roller coasters. You'd probably want some regulation of prices as well.

It may still not be a great idea, but I don't see any reason to assume such obviously ridiculous outcomes as you describe.
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Your idea of obviously stupid things is likely quite different from that of the companies who might think they can make a profit on roller coasters in the Grand Canyon and monorail trams cruising around Yellowstone.
 
Ron: I think the entire government should be privatized. Chuck E. Cheese could run the parks. Everything operated by tokens. Drop in a token, go on the swing set. Drop in another token, take a walk. Drop in a token, look at a duck. |
 
I think it's a very bad idea. Perhaps it's my bias, as I am a big fan of unspoiled wilderness.

But corporations exist to make money for shareholders. Everything else is secondary. I have a hard time believing any corporation would risk short or medium term profits out of the goodness of their hearts.

For unpleasantness in National Parks, look at the Hetch Hetchy valley. It makes me sad.
 
Cuddles said:
Why would they? Having something privately managed does not mean giving them free reign to do whatever the hell they feel like. Just have the land privately owned but still restricted use and publicly accessible.
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Privately managed does not mean "privately owned". The government would still own it.
 
rustypouch said:
I think it's a very bad idea. Perhaps it's my bias, as I am a big fan of unspoiled wilderness.
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Why would a change in management mean a degradation of "unspoiled wilderness"? It's not like the company maintaining the campground would be permitted to build a water slide down El Capitan.

Nothing would change wrt the wilderness.
 
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