Covering congestion in Yellowstone
Why I wrote about shuttle systems in national parks
For the past few months, I have been weirdly obsessed with a 2022 Transit Feasibility Study. Obviously, part of me felt hopelessly geeky—who would read about shuttle buses and traffic congestion for fun? Especially given that it failed—who would read the sort of feasibility study that basically finds a project to be infeasible? But part of me has been convinced that this document could help me unlock a deeper mystery.
The study, which is available on the Yellowstone National Park website, examined the possibility of running shuttle buses in the Old Faithful-Madison corridor and Canyon Village areas. The Old Faithful-Madison corridor connects the park’s biggest attraction to its most popular entrance. Canyon Village is a sort of suburban mall sitting about a mile from a series of spectacular vistas that people often consume by automobile. Previous studies had identified these two areas as the most traffic-congested in Yellowstone. And now the question was: could public transport help?
When I first came across the study, I wanted to talk to somebody about it. But this was during the September government shutdown, and the park’s public affairs office was understandably booked. Meanwhile, the company that had prepared the study told me the project manager had retired. And—most surprising to me—several activists I knew seemed not to have heard of it.
To me, traffic congestion in Yellowstone is a big deal. It’s probably not bad by metropolitan standards, but it feels far worse than when I first encountered the park in 1988. I’m less likely to visit the park in high season today than I was in the ‘90s, largely because I don’t want to deal with the traffic. Many of my friends feel the same way. The most auto-resistant of them get downright angry that unlike Zion, Denali, or other parks, Yellowstone has no shuttle bus.
Why then had the Feasibility Study received zero media attention? Why, when people aimlessly pontificated, “Yellowstone should have shuttle buses,” did That Guy never say, “Actually, they did a study…”? Why weren’t there message boards filled with people questioning Assumption A or Logical Inference B?
If I could answer those questions, I could unlock the wider mystery: Why do people so rarely talk about the quality of the visitor experience in Yellowstone? For example, I was simultaneously investigating a 2011–2013 effort to build a parkwide shuttle system. It too had failed. Few people had heard of it, either. Why?
In the case of potential public transport systems, the answer I found was that even in a famous national park, knowledge has traditionally been limited to a small number of delightful transport geeks. I did eventually find some of these people, and they helped me tell these twin stories. The result is in my article “Cars, Shuttles and Congestion in Yellowstone,” published a few days ago in Mountain Journal.
The article answers all those Why questions. It lays out the feasibility study’s main conclusions about the Old Faithful and Canyon roads. It explores some tantalizing implications of those conclusions. It uses innovative storytelling techniques to try to bring knowledge of Yellowstone’s management challenges to a wider audience. I won’t duplicate that material here. Instead, I’ll try to summarize where this research led me.
The bad news: public transport is incredibly complicated, especially in a remote, rural area where a massive national park boasts 350 miles of road and five entrances. It matters what you care about: sustainability? access? minimizing infrastructure? fairness? freedom? Or reducing congestion? It may not be feasible to meet all those criteria simultaneously.
The good news: Most Yellowstone visitors are relatively unconcerned. In a 2024 Visitor Use survey, 98 percent rated their Yellowstone experience as “good” or “excellent” despite traffic congestion. Nor does congestion on tiny ribbons of pavement have much effect on Yellowstone’s vast backcountry, the wellspring of its wondrous wildlife.
The better news: writing this article allowed me to profile a group of caring, thoughtful people who took some big risks to try to solve some big problems. The deeper I dug into their story, the more my obsession made sense.
We all participate in initiatives that fail, feasibility studies that demonstrate infeasibility, reports that don’t get reported on. And if we don’t, we should. Because our fulfillment doesn’t depend on success. The journey matters more than the destination.
As my quest to sate my obsession kept taking new twists and turns, I kept realizing: the journey I love is the discovery-and-writing. I am glad the article “succeeded” in the form of being published by a magazine I admire. I hope it “succeeds” by other definitions too. But like the people who tried to set up shuttle systems, or investigated their feasibility, or pondered the wider management challenges, to me “success” was the opportunity to take the journey.
End notes:
This is a memoir-essay about the process of writing the article. If you’re thinking, c’mon, just tell me about the traffic!, please visit “Cars, Shuttles and Congestion in Yellowstone.” It’s free.
Huge props to the many people I interviewed for that article (including several who didn’t get quoted), as well as editor Joe O’Connor.
John — The last words of your post: “‘success’ was the opportunity to take the journey.” Perfect! I wish those words had occurred to me over the 13 years since the sad end of my involvement in the Linx Cooperative Yellowstone Transit project. I find it strange to look back wistfully, even with an internal smile, on a grand “failure.” But now I understand: Success was the opportunity to take the journey. Which I treasure.
I'm not sure it's good news that visitors are unconcerned. It's the same thing with newcomers to Montana who think things are great and so what if Gallatin Valley is becoming a sprawling little city or Paradise Valley is filling up with homes? People from overcrowded areas have a very low bar for what constitutes a quality outdoor experience, and the value of solitude, among other things, is increasingly lost on many people. Mankind's perspective on natural experiences is changing, and not for the better (and the change doesn't benefit nature, either).