Zion National Park has gone fully electric.
The park’s popular shuttle system now has 30 electric vehicles — all that it needs to roll out a zero-emission fleet that’s been years in the making. The EV shuttles will replace propane-powered buses that have carried an estimated 95 million visitors up and down Zion Canyon since 2000.
National Park Service Director Chuck Sams remembers how different the park looked three decades ago before the propane shuttles were rolled out. Back then thousands of cars crowded the park’s scenic drive. Today, the contrast is stark.
“We had nearly 96,000 visitors over Labor Day weekend. If you think [that’s] around three people per car, that means there were 30,000 less cars in the park,” Sams said at a Sept. 4 event to commemorate the project.
Since the park first introduced its free shuttle system, annual visitation has nearly doubled — from 2.4 million people in 2000 to more than 4.6 million people in 2023. As the propane buses reached the end of their lifespans, the effort to replace them became a priority, Sams said. The switch to EVs will help Zion manage its booming visitor numbers while continuing to protect the landscape and clean air they come to experience.
“That's extremely important as we continue to find innovative new ways in using the best science and Indigenous knowledge to be able to combat climate change, and it's happening right here at Zion National Park,” Sams said.
The park service has more than 12,000 vehicles nationwide and the goal is to electrify even more of that fleet. The Zion project, he said, can serve as both an experiment and an example for other parks as they work to become more sustainable.
“This is going to be a model for the rest of the country. This is the state-of-the-art electric bus fleet in the country. It's going to set the standard for other national parks,” said Robin Carnahan of the U.S. General Services Administration, the federal agency that helped Zion acquire the buses.
The project cost around $37 million, with $33 million coming from the U.S. Department of Transportation. The rest came from local county governments, the Zion National Park Forever Project and other grants and donations.
Visitors will likely notice some differences the first time they board one of the EV buses.
For starters, the new shuttles don’t make as much noise as the old propane ones, said Zion Transportation Manager Lisa White. That means people can enjoy bird calls and babbling brooks without the drone of passing engines.
“The soundscape is amazing. We've actually had to add little bike bells because they're so quiet that people can't hear them coming.”
The buses also feature air conditioning. That new amenity could become increasingly important for visitor safety as climate change brings more extreme heat to southern Utah in the future.
As with any large project, White said there have been plenty of challenges, from lining up all the funds to making sure the infrastructure is in place to keep the buses running. Collaboration between the National Park Service and a host of other government agencies and local groups helped carry it across the finish line.
That also included Indigenous peoples who call this region home.
Kaibab Band of Paiute Indians Tribal Chairman Roland Maldonado said his tribe’s homelands have seen tremendous change over the years, and Zion, which bears the Indigenous name Mukuntuweap, is no exception. When tribal members get to be part of shaping that change, he said it’s a big step toward stewarding Zion in the best possible way.
“This place was never owned by anyone, never claimed. It's always been here for the people, and that's still the case,” Maldonado said.
“That's the way we need to keep thinking about things, to keep understanding how this impacts all of us and why it's worth protecting.”
The next hurdle for Zion is installing the last of the 31 chargers the buses will need. The park has already installed 17 charging stations and expects to build the remainder by early 2025. The electricity for those chargers will come from Rocky Mountain Power through the existing power grid.
