GATLINBURG, Tenn. — Pulling into the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, visitors can't miss the signs. Several of them point out the new "Park it Forward initiative," and the role visitors must play to help the program run smoothly.
It's been a month since GSMNP rolled out the program. In that month, GSMNP staff spent a lot of time educating the public on what it entails.
"Park it forward means that visitors now are required to display a valid parking tag in their vehicle if they were parked any longer than 15 minutes anywhere throughout the park," said Emily Davis, who works in communications for GSMNP.
The goal of the initiative was to generate some extra money for the national park. In 2021, the Great Smoky Mountains was the most visited national park with 14.1 million visitors. Straub said that’s more than Yellowstone (4.9 million), Yosemite (3.3 million) and Grand Canyon (4.5 million) national parks combined.
Yet, In 2021, the Great Smoky Mountains' $20.6 million budget lagged behind Yosemite ($31 million), Yellowstone ($37 million) and the Grand Canyon ($23 million), despite having more than three times the visitors.
GSMNP says 100% of the money generated through the Park it Forward will stay within the park.
According to Davis, in the past month, GSMNP sold 29,000 daily parking tags at $5 each. They sold 14,000 weekly parking tags at $15 each. They also sold 19,000 annual parking tags at $40 each. Those numbers reveal GSMNP generated over $1 million in the first month of the program.
The park also made it easy to purchase tickets. Visitors can go to kiosks located at seven locations, purchase tickets at the visitors center, or buy them online.
"It was easy and for just $40 and I'm supporting the park. That's what's important," said one woman who bought an annual pass.
But, what happens if visitors don't buy a parking tag?
"If some vehicles are parked longer than 15 minutes, they'll get a courtesy notice, again, just part of the educational piece — why it's so important that people are following the program," Davis said.
Davis also said, at the one-month mark, they are starting to work through some kinks with the program.
"We're still learning about what's working best and where we might need to make some adjustments. And some places we have seen some ways to make some improvements are areas where we might need to add more of these automated field machines, or areas where the traffic flow of people walking may make more sense to move that machine to a different location. We're also working with some additional local vendors to sell parking tags in their stores. A recent example is Greenbrier grocery," Davis said.
Visitors can buy parking tags online here.