Comment by tdaltonc | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tdaltonc | Hacker News Reader

Here's a proposal for fixing this. I'll use the national parks as an example.

Yosemite is hugely popular and we need to find some just way to limit the number of people going in. There are three ways to visit Yosemite. PATRON ticket, MERIT ticket, and LOTTERY ticket. All are non-transferable.

The PATRON tickets are auctioned off. This raises a huge amount of money to maintain the parks and make the other tickets completely free.

The MERIT tickets are earned by visiting the less popular parks. You get park-points and eventually you earn enough to earn access to the really cool stuff. And you've also learned to appreciate what you're going to be looking at. If you've climbed some of the less popular climbing spots in the US, it should be easy for you to get access to half dome.

The LOTTERY tickets are free and open to everyone. Enter as often as you want. The lotteries are far enough out that you'll have time to plan around winning.

There are a lot of persnickety details, but I trust the Parks Service to be competent.

The same basic system could be used to fix basically any over-accessed place (famous galleries, Everest, Galapagos, etc). I think that everyone can get behind at least one of these principles (patronage, merit, persistence) and the vast majority of people can get behind the idea of needing the balance all three.

The problem with that is that many, if not all, people have the attitude of: that is a publicly funded good, paid for in part with my money, so why shouldn't I have access to it?

What you seem to argue for with this is the privatization of our public spaces. Otherwise how do you ensure access to the publicly funded public good? Or am I way off base with this?

There are still entrance fees for national parks in the United States, for example. It would just be part of the cost.

The auctioned tickets would probably still feel unfair as the rich would be more likely to enjoy the benefits of public funding. So you're not that off base.

> ... a publicly funded good, paid for in part with my money, so why shouldn't I have access to it?

This obviously doesn't apply to certain areas of police stations and other publicly funded goods. Maybe elaborating a bit more will clear up the distinction.

I have access to the police, regardless of whether or not I have access to their weapons or evidence room.

Shutting off the park limits access to a public good. It would be like the city police not responding to one part of town, and in this case (lotteries or patronage) ensures that the rich get served first. That would rub people the wrong way, I think.

Does that clarify?

National parks are not a perfect public good since they do have a practical limit on usage, unlike say, a lighthouse or clean air. Given this scarcity, a pricing mechanism such as tdaltonc suggests is reasonable solution.

As others have pointed out: Parks already have patchwork fees, lotteries, and day-pass limits. This would just be a more holistic version of that patchwork.

As far as "whenever I want it" public access, I think that most parks, and even some parts of every park, would be open to car traffic. So if you're willing to pay with your time, under this system (same as under the current system), you can go whenever.

At least with parks, they are an area of conservation before they are a tourist attraction. You are paying for this land to be conserved in its natural state. Traffic to the park must therefore be limited to ensure the park is actually preserved and not destroyed by human activity. Visiting the park is a privilege, not a right. The right is that the park exists at all.

You need to watch Ken Burns The National Parks: America's Greatest Idea because the parks are to be conserved for future generations in hopes that they can enjoy the public good just as we get to.

Some national parks already have lottery systems for certain areas, e.g. to hike to the top of Yosemite's Half Dome: https://www.nps.gov/yose/planyourvisit/hdpermits.htm

Some more: https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/destinations/2018/04/0...

I've actually won that lottery before. The process of going through it was looming large in by mind when I came up with this model. As we were packing to go, a friend of means asked if he could join. I had to tell him that there was no way for him to buy-in on joining. We would have gladly endowed Yosemite a bench to be able to join. That experience also loomed.

I think this goes against the initial concept of the US National Parks. It's owned by the people, and meant to be seen and experienced at any time.

There are days that I needed to be recharged emotionally and could drive to Yosemite Valley and sit on a rock and listen to the wind. Yes, there we lots of people, but the quiet and calm was respected and maintained.

Perhaps a better solution would be stronger consequences to those who violate trash, light, and sound pollution or those who damage the wildness intentionally.

But people need to have the freedom to visit these places on a whim.

That won't hold up when a million other people also want to go sit on a rock and listen to the wind at the same time. At least the experience, and place, will be... quite different. There are requirements for infrastructure and unavoidable damage done when visitor numbers increase. Even if you don't think we're near the point where the trade-off's too great—surely there exists such a point, right? Where access has to be limited somewhat to protect the thing being accessed?

I don't know when you were going to Yosemite, but the really cool stuff is either (1) limited access based on lotteries, (2) paved trails with trash cans, guard rails, and foot patrols. There are also small fees all over the place.

The "zero limits" model you appear to be advocating for does not exist. The "lock the gates" dystopia you're arguing against is not what I'm advocating for.

I'm talking about using a more holistic approach to access limit where access limits are already in place and having a frame work for extending access limits when and where access limits are the best way to preserve the experience.

I'll confess that my last visit was in 2015, but I've never felt crowded there during my many visits. And of course, a "zero limits" model is not what anyone wants, nor what I'm advocating.

Half Dome is the only lottery-limited trail, and only the very end of the trail, at that.

Other than the entry fee, and a campsite fee if you're camping, there are no other fees.

quibbles: There are also back country fees and the back country and Donohue are access limited, though not by lottery.

The back country fees are for permits for camping in the back country. They are just a different kind of camping fee.

If you are just day hiking you don't need to pay a fee. The back country is not limited by anything other than the amount of work involved in reaching the back country, which varies from as little as 2-3 miles in the High Sierra portion of Yosemite or 5-6 miles from the Valley.

The Donohue restrictions were intended for the primary purpose of maintaining access to back country trails for Yosemite visitors, who were being crowded out by JMT hikers using non-traditional trailheads to get around capacity limits on the traditional JMT trailheads in Yosemite (i.e., Happy Isles).

> Perhaps a better solution would be stronger consequences to those who violate trash, light, and sound pollution or those who damage the wildness intentionally.

I like the idea - asshole tax. Littered in your own city? That's another few months wait for that vacation. Vegetarian, or vegan? Cheaper flights. It'd force people to be "pious", which would be great in some respects, but mostly police-statey...

Yosemite (and other parks) should at least limit more interior roads to shuttles. If you want to go in, park your car outside and ride the shuttle. Would cut down on the noise and pollution. (Exceptions for disabled, etc.)

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