Fwd: Trump administration proposes raising national park fees for some visitors
Duncan Morrow
Trump administration proposes raising national park fees for some visitors
A surcharge for international visitors to national parks could generate $90 million
By Kylie Mohr,Big Sky Country Contributing Parks Editor
The Donald Trump administration is proposing a “surcharge for foreign visitors” to national parks while also suggesting $1.2 billion in cuts to the National Park Service’s funding next year.
Details on the proposed fee increase for international tourists are scant. But the idea is outlined in the Interior Budget in Brief for fiscal year 2026, roughly halfway through a 130-page document in a section about the National Park Service’s recreation fee program, which is authorized by the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act.
“This Act authorizes NPS to collect recreation fees at select parks and requires fee revenues be used to improve visitor services and enhance the visitor experience at those parks and throughout the National Park System,” the document reads. “In 2026, NPS will establish a surcharge for foreign visitors that is estimated to generate more than $90 million to keep national parks beautiful.”
Details on how the $90 million figure was calculated aren’t provided. The park service didn’t respond to a request for more information. According to a park service website about entrance fees, at least 80% of funding from such fees stays in the park where it’s collected, while the remainder is used to benefit parks that don’t collect fees or need additional revenue.
Entrance fees help fund everything “from trail repairs and educational programs to law enforcement and visitor services,” said Emily Douce, deputy vice president of government affairs for the National Parks Conservation Association, in a statement.
National parks and national monuments saw 13.3 million international visitors in 2016, according to the U.S. Travel Association. The association estimates that 14.6 million international visitors went to national parks in 2024. The park service did not respond to a request for updated international visitation statistics.
If $90 million in extra funding for parks were equally spread among 14.6 million international visitors, the surcharge would be a little over $6 per guest. Details weren’t provided on how the fees would be collected or how tour buses, for example, would be charged.
Some national park sites don’t currently charge entrance fees. But in general, there’s a fee to enter large, well-known national parks like Yosemite, Yellowstone and Grand Canyon. That includes various rates for private vehicles, individuals and annual passes. A park pass to all national parks, known as an America the Beautiful pass, is $80 a year, with discounts for seniors.
According to the budget brief, more than 330 million people visited national parks in 2024. That means international travelers could make up about 4% of total visitors to America’s national parks but are being looked to as an additional revenue source at a time that the Trump administration is also proposing sweeping budget cuts — almost 40% of the agency’s funding.
Charging some visitors more than others isn’t unprecedented. Kruger National Park in South Africa charges foreign visitors $25 a day, while locals pay approximately $6, according to the Property and Environment Research Center, or PERC. A similar situation is true in the Galapagos, PERC says, where tourists pay $100 while Ecuadorians pay $6. State parks often charge out-of-state residents more for access, and hunting and fishing licenses also cost more for nonresidents.
PERC has advocated for international visitors to pay more than domestic visitors in the past as a source of revenue for the park service’s deferred maintenance backlog, estimated to be more than $23 billion in fiscal year 2023. PERC CEO Brian Yablonski told SFGATE he’d suggested the idea to Interior Department Secretary Doug Burgum in an April meeting. Burgum seemed enthused, according to Yablonski.
“We’re having a moment where all the stars might be aligning here,” Yablonski said. PERC’s economists, who focus on a market-based approach to conservation challenges, have been looking at “smart pricing ideas to help fix our national parks” since the 1990s. “The low-hanging fruit are international visitors,” Yablonski said. “Once you start talking about charging domestic visitors more, you’ll get more opposition.”
PERC’s research, Yablonski said, suggests a much higher fee of $100 per international visitor could be feasible. "The exciting part of this is that the administration clearly wants to make this a priority,” Yablonski said. “And we want to help them implement it.”
The National Parks Conservation Association took a more measured approach to the suggestion, expressing some hesitancy about new fees at a time of budget cuts. “After years of chronic underfunding, our national parks increasingly rely on these fees to enhance the visitor experience,” Douce said in a statement. “However, they should not replace annual appropriations from Congress.”
While the association said it supports efforts to help address maintenance needs, Douce also expressed concerns about additional fees potentially limiting access. “We believe fees should never become a barrier that keeps people from experiencing America’s most iconic places,” her statement said. “As the administration and Congress considers this approach, it must ensure the policy is fair, equitable and doesn’t compromise access.”