• The Yosemite
Valley plan, released three years ago and expected to cost about $440 million
over a decade, is designed to improve visitor experience in the valley. Plans
for a "more natural Yosemite" calls for an approximately 50 percent
reduction in the number of rooms, cabins and campsites for overnight
accommodation, the removal of historic bridges, roads and parking spaces at
scenic spots, with parking centralized in a 550-car lot at Curry Village. This
would help to reduce the effects of park crowding and traffic congestion.
Because of parking space cuts, most visitors would be bused into the valley
after leaving their cars in out-of-valley car parks. The plan is very much alive
and being implemented. There are 15 projects that comprise the first phase of
implementation, and these include a redesign of trails and approaches to lower
Yosemite Falls, building a new Indian cultural centre, removing a dam on the
Merced River and buying new shuttle buses.
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Visitors take in views of the lower falls at the newly restored Yosemite Falls
area.
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• A $13.5 million restoration project at
Yosemite Falls offers tourists wider trails and a larger viewing area from which
to observe the highest waterfall in North America.  more
• The Visitors Centre to be relocated
out-of-valley close to the car parks.
• The valley plan would return 176 acres
along the Merced River to natural habitat and restore its floodplain.
• Some camp sites and cabins removed from highly
valued natural habitats such as river areas.
• Camp fires restricted.
• Stables and trail-rides reduced.
• The only petrol station in the valley
closed.
• Park employees to be rehoused in accommodation
outside the Park.
• Admission fee increased from $5 to $20. |
