Approximately 900,000 people visited the St. Croix National Scenic Riverway in 2024. The number marks a new record, and an increase of about 12 percent from the previous year. The growing visitation is in line with a national trend, as National Parks across the United States saw 332 million people last year — two percent more than the previous year.

The St. Croix National Scenic Riverway protects 252 miles of the St. Croix and Namekagon Rivers. The National Park Service maintains numerous boat landings, campsites, and other facilities along the rivers. The agency also conducts scientific research, cultural preservation, interpretive programming, law enforcement, habitat restoration, and more along the lands and waters it manages.

“Our national parks are beloved and storied places that also support made-in-America jobs and serve as the beating, thriving heart of local and statewide tourism economies,” said Kristen Brengel, government affairs lead for the National Parks Conservation Association (NPCA). “Every dollar invested in our national parks provides at least a $15 return on investment.”

Increased visitors means more people are enjoying publicly owned national parks for beauty, recreation, solitude, clean water, rare and endangered species, and critical habitat. But this also puts strain on parks, causing everything from crowding to erosion, littering and other anti-social behavior. More people simply means more maintenance, safety, interpretation, and other services are required.

Popular public waters

The St. Croix River is free to visit and the only permit required is a free one for camping on one 25-mile stretch, so it’s difficult to count each visitor. But the National Park Service has protocols for gathering data and analyzing it to generate estimates of total visitor numbers. By keeping methods consistent from year-to-year, overall trends are observable.

“Each park unit that reports official visitor use statistics has a set of official Count Procedures,” the National Park Service says. “These procedures are unique to each park and represent an agreement between the superintendent of the park and the NPS Social Science Program regarding what data are to be collected and what calculations are to be made to support the reporting of official visitor use statistics for the park.”

The 2024 numbers show a continued climb, part of a trend that started twenty years ago and has possibly accelerated since the COVID-19 pandemic pushed more people to visit parks.

A recreation visit is defined by the National Park Service as “the entry of any person, except NPS and service personnel, onto lands or waters administered by the NPS. Same-day reentries, negligible transit, and entry to a detached portion of the same park on the same day are considered to be a single visit.”

While most visitors spend a day or less on the river, camping is also popular. It’s allowed throughout the St. Croix National Scenic Riverway at riverside campsites that usually feature picnic tables, tent pads, fire rings, and pit toilets. Sites are available on a first-come, first-served system with no permit or reservation required. Between Highway 8 (Taylors Falls and St. Croix Falls) to the Arcola High Bridge, a free annual permit is required. Between the High Bridge and the Boom Site, camping is allowed on islands, with some restrictions. More information is here.

The St. Croix National Scenic Riverway reports overnight visits to the park has climbed gradually over the past decade, with about 6,000 more campers last year than in 2014.

Downplaying data

The 2024 numbers were all provided by the National Park Service in an annual release of data. The agency usually publicizes the popularity of the country’s crown jewels around this time each year, but was instructed not to send out any press releases or social media posts about it this year, according to a memo obtained by the New York Times.

“The internal memo, issued on Wednesday, said the agency would ‘not issue a press release or other proactive communications, including social media posts’ regarding the numbers,” according to the newspaper. The author of the memo was not named.

It’s not clear why agency leaders would oppose sharing the visitor data. One possibility is that federal appointees know the rising visitor numbers would add to concerns about recent firings of National Park Service staff and other actions that have reduced abilities to maintain and manage National Parks.

Crippling chaos

National Parks receive the majority of their funding at the federal level through appropriations from Congress as part of the annual budget cycle. Since January, the executive branch, under the direction of the newly-established DOGE czar Elon Musk and executive orders issued by President Donald Trump, has laid off probationary employees and anyone else it can manage.

In the last month, the federal government has laid off more than a thousand National Park Service workers, hundreds more have quit or taken buyout offers, and others are not being hired for seasonal jobs. Staff at the St. Croix National Scenic Riverway have been affected.

For those still employed by the agency, doing their job has gotten much harder. On February 24, the Department of the Interior, which oversees the National Park Services, announced it was “reducing the spending threshold for all purchase and travel cards on Tuesday, February 25 to $1.” The independent group Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility released the information to the public, and said the move had essentially crippled the entire government agency.

PEER is also asking for signatures on a petition calling on the Department of the Interior to rehire critical employees.

“Many of our most popular national parks will be unable to operate without their seasonal employees,” stated PEER Executive Director Tim Whitehouse.

Another organization, the Association of National Park Rangers (ANPR), also criticized the layoffs and firings, pointing out layoffs could put environmental and cultural resources at risk from poachers and relic hunters.

“Knowing about the understaffing of parks could lead unscrupulous people to take advantage. Poaching of bears or caribou in Denali National Park in Alaska, or ginseng in Great Smoky Mountains National Park in Tennessee and North Carolina, or cacti in Saguaro National Park in Arizona may increase,” ANPR Executive Director Bill Wade said. “Relic-hunters in Gettysburg National Military Park in Pennsylvania or in Chaco Culture National Historical Park in New Mexico will be emboldened to steal irreplaceable artifacts.”

Determined dismantling

The federal government is also moving to cancel numerous leases for National Park Service visitor centers and other facilities around the country. That includes the nearby visitor center at the Science Museum of Minnesota for the Mississippi River National Recreation Area.

“The National Park Service just reported the highest visitation in its history, as the administration conducts massive firings and threatens to close visitor centers and public safety facilities,” said Theresa Pierno, president and CEO of the National Parks Conservation Association. “It’s a slap in the face to the hundreds of millions of people who explored our parks last year and want to keep going back. Americans love their national parks; these cuts do not have public support.”

She also said the moves are destroying the National Parks, reversing more than 100 years of preservation efforts.

“Quite simply and astonishingly, this is dismantling the National Park Service as we know it, ranger by ranger and brick by brick,” Pierno said. “For over a century, Americans have loved and fought to protect our national parks. This administration’s actions are a betrayal of that legacy. The American people expect leaders to protect our parks, not dismantle them.”

Speak up

Petition: Tell DOI to Rehire Vital National Park Service Employees (PEER)

More information

• National Park Service – Annual Visitation Statistics Release
• National Park Service Has Leadership Vacuum – National Parks Traveler
• National Park Service Sets Visitation Record Amid Historic Staffing Cuts – National Parks Conservation Association
• National Parks Face Crippling Seasonal Staff Shortfalls – Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility
• Where are the rangers? The sad tale of your national parks this summer – Association of National Park Rangers