For the first time in four years, Arches National Park won’t require visitors to have a timed-entry reservation.
The pilot program began in 2022 in response to overcrowding at the southeast Utah park. Arches’ annual visitation jumped by 73.6% in the previous decade to peak at just over 1.8 million people.
A National Park Service report released after the program’s first season found that it reduced congestion at the entry gate and around key spots like Delicate Arch and Devils Garden. Park reports from 2023 and 2024 heaped additional praise on the program, saying it relieved crowding and improved the visitor experience.
Despite that, the Trump administration ended the timed entry program on Feb. 18, along with similar ones at Glacier and Yosemite, saying the move would expand public access.
On top of the mass firings, budget cuts and government shutdown the park service has endured over the past year, conservation advocates like Linda Mazzu view this latest action as part of a “death by a thousand cuts.”
Mazzu is an executive council member with the Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks, which has denounced the Trump administration’s decision to end park reservations. She also worked as superintendent of Utah’s Bryce Canyon National Park from 2017-2021.
The long-term concern, she said, is that the federal government will allow the park experience to deteriorate and then use that as a reason to hand over management to an outside entity.
“Saying, ‘Well, this isn't working. We need to privatize this,’” Mazzu said. “I hope cooler minds will prevail at some point. In the meantime, it's just terrible.”
With Arches ditching reservations, park officials say visitors should be prepared to wait. The Arches website advises that if parking lots fill up, the park may close for three to five hours at a time. It suggests people use the bathroom, get a full tank of gas and gather water and snacks before getting in line at the entry gate.
“There's going to be a lot of people getting turned away during temporary closures,” Mazzu said. “Is that improved access? I don't think so.”
The National Park Service and the Department of the Interior declined to be interviewed for this story.
Arches’ reservation system is polarizing in the communities that surround the park, said Melisa Jeffers, Grand County’s economic development and communications coordinator.
“We see a bit of a reduction in crowding, and we also see a high rate of cancellation and folks reporting that they're not able to get into the park,” Jeffers said. “So, we have those two extremes that we've seen here on the ground.”
Timed entry has been great for local outfitters who have a concessionaire’s pass to bring people into the park without a reservation, she said, but other tourism-reliant businesses have faced challenges when visitors who can’t get a time slot decide to skip Grand County entirely.
Visitors also commonly experienced technical issues with the online reservation system, she said, which kept some people from getting an entry pass.
As Arches visitor numbers dropped during the pilot, she said the county also saw a steady decline in sales tax revenue. With some international tourists staying away from the U.S. in response to Trump’s rhetoric and policies, it may be hard to say what specifically caused those declines in recent months.
Much of the local discussion has coalesced around what Jeffers called a false binary: either Arches has a reservation system or the park sees horrible crowding. The county believes there should be more talk about alternatives that lie between those two poles.
To that end, Grand County has offered a proposal that explores ways the area may ease park congestion. County leaders presented the list of ideas to federal and state leaders at a meeting in late 2025, and Jeffers said it was well received. The county has also posted an online survey to gauge residents’ and visitors’ opinions about the suggestions.
One proposed alternative is a voluntary shuttle bus line. Zion and Bryce Canyon both operate shuttles from their gateway towns to trailheads and viewpoints in the parks.
A future bus might become part of an expanded Moab Area Transit system, she said, which could also improve service for residents. Grand County is working on feasibility studies for a shuttle line and figuring out the cost.
Other ideas include adding an automated lane at the entry gate and connecting Arches’ trail system with routes outside the park so that people could hike or bike in.
“We would really like to see them reduce car traffic, so there are a lot of different options,” she said, “to try to bring down some of that temperature and some of that heat and some of that polarization around issues that may not necessarily be zero-sum.”
Ultimately, however, actions within Arches’ borders are up to the federal government.
“We can offer solutions. We can be as helpful as we can possibly be, but we are not part of the decision-making process,” Jeffers said. “We don't have a seat at that table.”
Whatever happens at the park has profound ripple effects in Grand County, though. Arches injected $312 million into the local economy in 2024, according to park service data. And the county estimates 70% of its jobs are tied to park visitation.
“Almost everyone is impacted by tourism, so the stakes are high for us,” she said. “This is an important conversation. It's important that we get it right.”
A shuttle system could help relieve traffic at Arches, Mazzu said. She saw it work first-hand at Bryce Canyon. But operating a bus line is a big lift, she said, and would require a lot of money and effort.
“It's just difficult to do, and if they do it, it'll still take a long time to pull it off,” Mazzu said. “Until then, you’re going to have a lot of frustrated visitors.”
Adding or expanding parking lots at Arches would also be costly, she said, and new development often comes at the expense of the landscape. Additional crowding could also lead visitors to drive or walk on ground where they aren’t supposed to go.
The Coalition to Protect America’s National Parks estimates that the National Park Service has lost around a quarter of its staff since the start of the Trump administration in January 2025. With resources stretched thin, Mazzu said, some rangers will likely now have to spend their days directing traffic and cleaning up messes.
“We're going to have fewer and fewer people to try to keep track of all the impacts happening and to repair them,” Mazzu said. “It's just a recipe for disaster, unfortunately.”
So, she said the best thing park visitors can do this year is be kind to the rangers they meet on their travels.
