America's national parks are facing a steep repair bill of roughly $24 billion. This includes costs for aging roads, trails and bridges and in many cases, these repairs have been delayed for years.
This has raised concerns about safety and access during the busy summer travel season, and senior officer of the U.S. Conservation at the Pew Charitable Trust Rebekah Knuffe says infrastructure repair needs impacts not only the national parks but other public lands such as the Bureau of Land Management.
In 2020, the president signed into law the Great American Outdoors Act which was focused on addressing billions in deferred maintenance. It also guarantees permanent funding for the Land and Water Conservation Fund (LWCF) to support public access and outdoor recreation.
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This established for five years a bill that funded $1.9 billion a year roughly from energy development revenues to federal agencies, including the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management and US Forest Service, to clear maintenance backlogs.
While they've repaired over 3,800 assets across all public lands, legacy restoration funding and contributed to thousands of jobs, there are things that have not been fixed.
Knuffe added that families who are traveling this summer to national parks may notice that parking lots or bathrooms may be under repair.
Although the initial five-year fund has since expired, lawmakers have introduced bipartisan efforts to extend the fund and increase its annual capacity to tackle the backlog.
