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Utah’s national parks brought $1.9B in 2023 and towns like Moab are banking on it

Arches National Park, home to the iconic Delicate Arch, seen here on Oct. 12, 2023, saw $283 million in visitor spending in 2023. Utah’s national parks, monuments and recreation areas saw record spending and economic output for the third year in a row after a slump at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic
Sean Higgins
/
KUER
Arches National Park, home to the iconic Delicate Arch, seen here on Oct. 12, 2023, saw $283 million in visitor spending in 2023. Utah’s national parks, monuments and recreation areas saw record spending and economic output for the third year in a row after a slump at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic

Utah’s national parks, monuments and recreation areas had another record year in 2023.

The National Parks Service said Utah’s park service lands brought in $1.9 billion in visitor spending, contributed 26,500 jobs – and added $3 billion in economic output to local communities.

The state has been on a roll since 2021, setting records for visitation and visitor spending each year since a slump at the beginning of the 2020 pandemic.

Zion National Park leads the state in visitor spending at $676 million, followed by Glen Canyon National Recreation Area ($540 million) and then Arches National Park ($283 million). Of all the statewide spending that’s connected to parks, about 40%, approximately $770 million, is spent on lodging alone.

It was “a really good year,” said former Moab mayor and current Sunflower Hill Inn owner Emily Niehaus. She doesn’t just credit more visitors for the bump.

“What I'm seeing is that people are coming to Moab to stay in Moab, and they're staying a little bit longer, as opposed to rushing off to visit all the other national parks.”

As a gateway community, Moab gets to double dip with Arches or Canyonlands. And they are just the opening act. Niehaus said visitors are then looking into “the state parks that Moab has to offer, and just all the crazy fun recreation like river rafting and skydiving and jeeping and canyoneering.”

Capitol Reef National Park Visitor Center, Oct. 14, 2023. Record spending at Utah’s national parks, monuments and recreation areas helped support local “gateway communities” whose economies largely rely on tourism.
Sean Higgins
/
KUER
Capitol Reef National Park Visitor Center, Oct. 14, 2023. Record spending at Utah’s national parks, monuments and recreation areas helped support local “gateway communities” whose economies largely rely on tourism.

Even after a possible government shutdown last September led to a wave of cancellations, Niehaus said things bounced back quickly and local businesses were able to recover before the end of the year.

Lodging isn’t the only industry that saw a bump in visitors. Moab City Councilor Tawny Knuteson-Boyd’s husband runs a barber shop.

“His business is strictly walk-in and I think his observation is he's had more tourists, and he's had more overseas visitors,” she said. “Never did I think in a million years that people got their hair cut on vacation, but evidently it's a thing.”

And visitors staying longer is not happening by accident. It’s been part of the Utah Office of Tourism’s Red Emerald Strategic Plan since 2020.

“We really think about them as valued visitors,” said Managing Director Natalie Randall. They strive for what she calls “quality visitation” that strikes a better balance between tourists and the communities they visit.

“Individuals who are curious, wanting to extend their stay and then wanting to invest more in the communities that they're staying in so they're visiting like a resident, almost like how you or I would like to visit our communities.”

That messaging, Randall said, has also led to an increase in visitation during winter months that are not typically associated with vacations to Utah’s national parks. Although April-October is still peak visitation, state data shows December visits increased by 37% from 2017-2023.

“That’s a time frame that typically you don't see a lot of visitors to those areas, but a time that those communities are wanting to see additional dollars generated in their community,” Randall said.

“In Moab specifically, they've started looking at astrotourism, so potentially going to visit some of those popular national park site areas to see dark skies.”

Looking at this year, local business owners like Niehaus say an influx of businesses has spread out some of those visitors, but she thinks things are on track for another good tourist season at Utah’s gateway communities.

“We feel just as busy,” Niehaus said of Moab. “But I'm really interested to see what the numbers are for 2024.”

Sean is KUER’s politics reporter.
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