Yosemite National Park Overwhelmed by 'Disneyland-Level' Crowds After Ending Reservation System

Yosemite National Park has reportedly been swamped by visitors — including "Disneyland" level crowding over Memorial Day weekend — after the National Park Service ended a reservation system that managed crowd sizes. One visitor, Andranik Arakelyan, told ABC7 that some park-goers were waiting "for at least an hour and a half" just to enter the iconic California park. Typically, getting to any popular national park early is key to ensuring a parking spot, but another visitor, John Leerskov, told the outlet that by 7:30 a.m., there were no parking spots available. He said the conditions inside the park weren't much better. "It was a lot of shoulder to shoulder, a lot of chaos, a lot of angry people, a lot of oblivious people," he said. Some videos of the park showed dozens of cars parked illegally in areas that could damage the park's grounds. Conservationist Beth Pratt, who viewed the videos, told ABC7 she saw people parking in meadows and driving off the marked roads, calling it "horrendous." By March, Yosemite had already logged nearly 100,000 more visitors than at the same point last year, which some visitors claim has led to chaotic conditions at the park, according to ABC7. In March, the park saw 225,817 visitors. During the same period last year, it received only 155,758 visitors. The NPS told The Independent that “temporary traffic delays during high-interest events are not evidence of operational failure,” but “reflect the reality of managing one of the nation’s most visited national parks during peak demand.” “Yosemite continues to actively manage visitation through coordinated traffic operations, shuttle services, seasonal staffing increases, law enforcement presence, emergency response planning, interagency coordination, and real-time visitor communications,” the NPS said in a statement to The Independent. “The National Park Service remains focused on balancing public access, visitor safety, and resource protection. We encourage visitors to plan ahead, use available shuttle options where possible, carpool, arrive early, and check official park alerts before traveling.” Yosemite Superintendent Ray McPadden said in February — the same month the reservation system was ended — that a review of the reservation system showed it was not the most effective means of managing visitors. "While reservation systems are one valuable management tool, our data demonstrates that a season-wide reservation requirement is not the most effective approach for the coming season," he said at the time. The park service said that it now uses "real-time traffic management measures, including temporary traffic diversions when parking areas reach capacity and deployment of additional seasonal staff to manage high-use areas." The reservation system was eliminated to "support strong visitation in 2026," and it obviously worked, though perhaps not as intended. The NPS has pushed back on the claims of chaos at the park, telling Fox News Digital that the reports "are not an accurate characterization of current park operations." "Yosemite, like many iconic national parks, experiences periods of high visitation, particularly around weather-dependent events and holiday weekends," the official said. John Buckley, executive director of the Central Sierra Environmental Resource Center, told Fox News Digital he heard different reports from visitors. One told him that there were "wall to wall" crowds and that their visit "felt like a day at Disneyland." Others commiserated in a Facebook group for Yosemite visitors, with one commenter warning people should "plan on every single day between Memorial Day and Labor Day to be exceedingly crowded." Another concluded that the "only way to avoid summer crowds — to not go in summer!" But some commenters said they'd visited in March and experienced very minimal crowding, supporting the NPS's statement that the parks simply experience peaks and valleys in attendance like any other major tourist locale.