Many popular trailheads, fishing spots, picnic areas and campgrounds that are currently free would carry a $10 fee, according to the proposal.
Meanwhile, recreational use continued exploding, especially during the pandemic, while budgets remained stagnant. Getting the public to pay is the best way to generate the revenue needed to maintain existing amenities and build badly needed new ones, according to Whittekiend. So the forest is seeking to expand that fee program over the entire forest, to include the Cottonwoods, Logan Canyon,
. These fees can only be collected at locations with developed amenities, like toilets, picnic tables, parking, fishing access and trash collection. Officials looked at what Utah state parks and other recreation areas charge to determine that $10 was the appropriate fee. Where the new fee will see the biggest bite are the busy, and currently free, trailheads in Little and Big Cottonwood Canyon, where parked cars often overflow onto the sides of the highway.
“We have to have a minimum of amenities to be able to charge a fee at a site, whether it be trailhead or a picnic area. Any of those that currently lacks those amenities, we would be putting those things in,” Whittekiend said. “So say if you have to put in garbage cans or interpretive signs, tables, whatever that might be, we would we would look to bring those sites up to standard to be able to charge a fee.
Whittekiend said 95% of the fees paid remain with the forest and would largely go toward maintaining the sites. And they can be leveraged into grants to improve trailheads, day-use sites and campgrounds, and build new trails.