Yosemite National Park summer reservations open after delay

Yosemite National Park announced it has opened reservations for summer camping in a number of its popular campgrounds after a new reservation system and staff cuts caused delays and questions about when they would become available again.

Reservations for dates between June 15 and July 14 in the Upper Pines, Wawona and Hodgdon Meadow campgrounds, among others, were made available at 7 a.m. Monday. Reservations for dates between July 15 and Aug. 14 open at 7 a.m. on March 31. Reservations can be made on Recreation.gov.

In February, reservations were delayed indefinitely while the National Park Service received approval from President Trump’s administration on its new reservation system.

Then sweeping cuts to the federal workforce announced by the administration a few days later made it unclear when reservations would become available again. About 10% of the Park Service’s staff has been lost amid the cuts with hundreds more taking buyouts offered by the administration.

But on March 20, the National Park Conservation Assn. announced it was authorized to reinstate all probationary park staff who were fired the previous month. The group said the job cuts had caused the reservation delay.

Yosemite National Park had more than 4 million visitors last year. Its visits peak on average between June and August, according to Park Service statistics.