Perhaps they could dead end our road too. It’s been closed for repairs for a month. Bliss, no more traffic tearing along a little winding road with people walking dogs. Kids hanging out. Signs everywhere saying slow down. 25. Etc. To no avail. Total disrespect for residents. Sick of it.
OMGosh. On early morning bicycling, I've encountered Jordan Pond House suppliers driving BIG trucks in the wrong direction on one-way stretches of the Loop Road. They seem to take a Right turn coming out of JPH and just keep going.
We are seeing overtourism everywhere. Overtourism is just another name for overpopulation. We have too many people in the US and globally, and unless and until we acknowledge that we will continue to see more regulation of parks, reservations for entry, lotteries for campsites, damage to wildlands, not to mention housing shortages and high housing costs, along with a host of other negative consequences to human health, quality of life and the natural world.
Three weeks ago I watched a video on YouTube documenting a traffic jam at the entrance to Yosemite National Park. Traffic was backed up two lanes wide for a distance of 8 miles! Wait times to get into the park exceeded 4 hours! I can hear readers saying to themselves, "Well it's not that bad here!" to which I would respond, "Not yet." But we are catching up fast. In the spring of 2021 I drove over to Jordan Pond to work on a long term photo project documenting the seasons on the pond. It was a sunny weekend day and when I arrived there I was unable to find a single parking spot despite having checked every one of the various parking lots. Later that summer I rode my bicycle from Seawall to Bass Harbor Light at around 3 in the afternoon. When I turned off Rt 102 on the access road to the lighthouse I was horrified to encounter a bumper to bumper line of cars going all the way from Rt 102 to the small lighthouse parking lot. My being on a bicycle enabled me to ride down to the lighthouse where I observed the cause of the traffic jam. The parking lot was completely full and those in line were forced to wait until a single car exited the parking lot allowing a single car from the jam to take its place. My guess is that the last car in the line would have had to wait in excess of 3 to 4 hours before they would reach the lighthouse parking lot. One wonders how dire the situation must become before "enough is enough" finally forces us to deal with the growing destruction of this lovely park via overuse?
Perhaps they could dead end our road too. It’s been closed for repairs for a month. Bliss, no more traffic tearing along a little winding road with people walking dogs. Kids hanging out. Signs everywhere saying slow down. 25. Etc. To no avail. Total disrespect for residents. Sick of it.
OMGosh. On early morning bicycling, I've encountered Jordan Pond House suppliers driving BIG trucks in the wrong direction on one-way stretches of the Loop Road. They seem to take a Right turn coming out of JPH and just keep going.
We are seeing overtourism everywhere. Overtourism is just another name for overpopulation. We have too many people in the US and globally, and unless and until we acknowledge that we will continue to see more regulation of parks, reservations for entry, lotteries for campsites, damage to wildlands, not to mention housing shortages and high housing costs, along with a host of other negative consequences to human health, quality of life and the natural world.
Closing roads is a slippery slope, uphill or down. I'm inclined to decline.
Three weeks ago I watched a video on YouTube documenting a traffic jam at the entrance to Yosemite National Park. Traffic was backed up two lanes wide for a distance of 8 miles! Wait times to get into the park exceeded 4 hours! I can hear readers saying to themselves, "Well it's not that bad here!" to which I would respond, "Not yet." But we are catching up fast. In the spring of 2021 I drove over to Jordan Pond to work on a long term photo project documenting the seasons on the pond. It was a sunny weekend day and when I arrived there I was unable to find a single parking spot despite having checked every one of the various parking lots. Later that summer I rode my bicycle from Seawall to Bass Harbor Light at around 3 in the afternoon. When I turned off Rt 102 on the access road to the lighthouse I was horrified to encounter a bumper to bumper line of cars going all the way from Rt 102 to the small lighthouse parking lot. My being on a bicycle enabled me to ride down to the lighthouse where I observed the cause of the traffic jam. The parking lot was completely full and those in line were forced to wait until a single car exited the parking lot allowing a single car from the jam to take its place. My guess is that the last car in the line would have had to wait in excess of 3 to 4 hours before they would reach the lighthouse parking lot. One wonders how dire the situation must become before "enough is enough" finally forces us to deal with the growing destruction of this lovely park via overuse?