Yellowstone National Park

Social Studies Explorer An Expedition into the Geography, History and Economy of

The World’s First National ParkMiss. Lassiter

UNIT Three: Economics and Civics

• How Yellowstone National Park affects the economy in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho

• Politics and the Park

Economics in the Park- Economics is the social science that studies economic activity to gain an

understanding of the processes that govern the production, distribution and consumption of goods and services in an economy.

- Tourism is a powerful driver in local economies. It fuels communities and encourages entrepreneurship and opportunity.

- A NPS Park Research Study into Yellowstone’s Economy found out that in 2010 334 million dollars was contributed to the regional economies of Montana, Wyoming and Idaho (within radius of park gateway communities).

- 52% of the spending was in lodging, food and beverage- 29% of the spending was in retail- 10% of the spending was for entertainment (festivals, plays, movies)- 7% of the spending was for Transportation Services (gas)- 2% - Groceries sales

• Much of Yellowstone spending was invested in local businesses, local businesses have a commitment to the community. Local businesses sponsor school teams, promote local events like County Fairs and invest deep roots in their community.

• The Yellowstone tourism economy produced 4,900 jobs in the local economies.

• Yellowstone has been an economic driver since ancient times, when the Clovis tribe used Yellowstone’s store of Obsidian glass to make tools and trade the obsidian along their trade networks. Other native tribes throughout history used the resources of Yellowstone for sustenance and trade, helping to support the economic health of the tribe.

• Fur trappers saw the Yellowstone region as an economic conduit for their hunting of beaver and other game.

• In the 1870s, the Northern Pacific Railroad’s Jay Cooke advocated for the creation of Yellowstone as a national park in order to drive tourism to the area. Railroad travel would help the Northern Pacific growth their brand and also invest in local park communities to support the park tourism trade. Out of this trade, businesses such as merchants and farmers can be incorporated and supported by tourism.

What drives tourism to Yellowstone?- Natural wonders: Yellowstone’s

wonderland of awe-inspiring features attract tourists from around the world.

- Geysers, thermal features, canyons, mountains…

- Wildlife: Grizzly Bears, Bison and Wolves are major economic drivers of the park. A study in 2014 concluded that a majority of visitors would pay more for park admission if they were guaranteed to see a grizzly.

- Fishing – world class angling is the best in the world (Madison, Firehole, Yellowstone…)

- Recreation!

• Yellowstone: micro-economy within the park boundaries:• Park fees: Park fees help to fund the park and provide for programs within the park. Fees

include park entrance passes, backcountry permits and map sales.• The Park makes money through concessionaire contracts. These contracts outsource park

concessionaire management to private corporations. In recent years this has become controversial. Private concessionaire firms like Xanterra and Delaware North hire many employees from overseas and sell non-American goods, which in a depressed US economy has caused backlash. Park Concessionaire’s are often poorly managed and yield on average 1% of profits to the park. Many of the contracts are based on lobbying and politics versus the public and financial interest of the park. Xanterra made 1 billion dollars on its park enterprise in 2010 (park report, Xanterra’s financial statements). With park’s desperate for funding, it seems counterintuitive to many economists to outsource the in-park concessions to non-competitive monopolies. Non-profit groups such as the Yellowstone Association sell goods in the park visitor centers which goes to help support Yellowstone directly and indirectly – a much better partner (many argue) than a private corporation• Many local private enterprises outside the park oppose the concessionaire contracts as it stymies their

local interests and is based on political clout. On the upside, Xanterra and other concessionaires are responsible for maintaining the park structures. Xanterra’s new contract in Glacier NP will lead to millions of dollars in private funds used for repair of park lodges.

• Others argue the prices in the park, fixed by the park service are unaffordable. This is a market factor NPS adjusts annually with prices adjusted down in the wake of the Great Recession

• The advantage of outsourcing concessions is the park service is a public entity, not a business and their focus should be on park upkeep and education. This is a prominent civics and economics issue within the park micro-economy

Old Faithful Area: Economic Heartbeat of Yellowstone

• Old Faithful is the economic center of Yellowstone. Old Faithful is the top tourist spot in the park. The demand of services in the area led for the market to respond with increased lodging, food and services.

• Lodging:• Old Faithful Inn: Built in 1903/4 this historic inn is the crown jewel of

Yellowstone’s park hotels. It is managed by Xanterra. The inn has 327 rooms, several dining options, including the elegant Old Faithful Dining Room, and retail options.

• Snow Lodge: The headquarters for winter lodging in the park. Has retail and dining options

• Old Faithful Lodge – the rustic cabins are affordable options for park visitors

• Dining:• Old Faithful Inn-upscale dining

• Obsidian Dining Room – Snow Lodge – moderately priced fare

• Geyser Grill – quick stop food for tourists on the go

• Delaware North General Stores

• Retail: Park concessionaries act as a B2B and Business to Consumer purveyors providing a secondary network of economy activity in the park. A majority of the park tee-shirts sold by Xanterra are printed in Bozeman Montana, creating jobs in Bozeman’s economy. Pottery, art and photography, foods and wares from local businesses are sold in General Stores providing further investment into the Greater YNP economy

Major Park Economic Districts• Mammoth Hot Springs: hotel, gas, restaurants, souvenirs (Visitor Center), retail,

expedition outfitters (tours), campground

• Lake District: hotel, lodge, cabins, restaurants, retail…

• Fishing Bridge: food and retail

• Bridge Bay Marina: Boat rentals and entertainment (cruises of Yellowstone Lake), RV campground

• Grant Village: hotel, restaurant, tours, retail, campground, gas

• Roosevelt: rustic cabins, restaurant, outfitters, tours, stage coach dinner and other services

• Canyon Village: hotel is being remodeled; new lodging being built to accommodate park guests, campground

• Madison Campground (one of largest campgrounds in the park); Madison Campground is a crossroads of economics – fees going to NPS for campsite; Xanterra collects the fees; many campers purchase food and gear in nearby West Yellowstone – expanding economic activity outside of the park to gateway towns

Gateway Towns: a town that services park tourism

• Western Entrance: West Yellowstone MT

• Northern Entrance: Gardiner MT

• NE Entrance: Cooke City

• Southern Entrance: Tetons/Jackson Hole

• Eastern Entrance: Cody WY (70 miles east of YNP)

• Red Lodge (NE via Beartooth Highway)

• Regional: Bozeman MT, Livingston MT, Idaho Falls, Billings MT

West Yellowstone

• West Yellowstone: located on the western boundary of Yellowstone. West Yellowstone lies at the junction of the Gallatin Canyon, Hebgen Lake and nearby Madison Canyon. West Yellowstone is a major tourism center for park traffic. West is the most frequented of the park gateway towns. It has dozens of lodging options, restaurants, an IMAX, Playhouse (Playmill Theatre), and numerous of events to attract tourism to West Yellowstone

• West Yellowstone’s economy is completely contingent on tourism. It has a diverse tourism model: angling and wilderness guides (Madison River is premier fly-fishing destination), Yellowstone, day trips to Virginia City (ghost town – built on YNP tourist economy), lodging and retail, food and beverage. West Yellowstone is the ‘snow-mobile’ capital of the world.

• West Yellowstone’s positioning as an winter destination has elevated the economy to an all season destination. Its winter recreation is concentrated on cross-country skiing, downhill (Big Sky Ski Resort), ice-climbing and most importantly snowmobiling.

• West is the snowmobile capital of the world. Much of YNP is only accessible by skis, snowmobiles and snow coaches during the winter months. Snowmobiling is highly controversial in the park and was banned in the Clinton era due to its high emissions and threats to the YNP ecosystem. Economically snowmobiling a lifeblood for West’s economy in the winter, attracting winter enthusiasts to the town. Tourists spend money in hotels, retail and restaurants providing jobs for locals. Snowmobilers also spend money with park concessionaires.

• Are the economic impacts of snowmobiling in Yellowstone worth the environmental risks? The debate continues. West Yellowstone lobbies politicians for more snow mobile protections making this a platform issue in Montana campaigns.

West Yellowstone has carved out a niche as a winter destination for park travelers

The Grizzly & Wolf Discovery Center is a major tourist attraction and educational resource in West Yellowstone

Gardiner Montana• The historical entrance to Yellowstone, Gardiner lies just north of the 45th

parallel five miles north of Mammoth Hot Spring. Gardiner’s position at the base of Yankee Jim Canyon, south of the wide open Paradise Valley makes it a pristine location for park tourism. Gardiner is crisscrossed by the Yellowstone River and also Gardiner River.

• Gardiner sees less tourism traffic than West Yellowstone, but remains a flourishing gateway town with hotels, restaurants and retail services. Gardiner’s economy is powered by the park service, Yellowstone Association and park concessionaires. Many park officials live in Gardiner. Xanterra’s park headquarters is in Gardiner.

• Gardiner’s economy is also fueled by area ranching. Gardiner is the only entrance to the park open to automobiles all year, giving it a unique winter advantage of catering to tourists wanting to experience Yellowstone in the winter without braving the elements of snowmobiling or skiing.

Gardiner Montana Paradise Valley

Cooke City Montana

• Cooke City is completely surrounded by Yellowstone and National Forests. It is a unique gateway town in his history as a mining camp to tourist outpost.

• Cooke City has 100 year-round residents, the population soaring to over 1000 in the summer months. It’s economy is driven by timber, mining and tourism.

• Cooke City is a remote and quaint tourist town where you can get lost in the scenery of the Beartooths and nearby Lamar Valley. Accessible via the Grand Loop Road all year, Cooke City is a popular winter wildlife viewing hub for launching expeditions into the Lamar Valley or snowmobiling in NFS lands.

• In the summer its traffic primarily comes from Red Lodge and the Beartooth Highway

Cooke City General Store Soda Butte – Lamar Valley

Cody: ‘The wildest way into the west’• Cody is the largest of Yellowstone’s gateway towns by population (8,000 – 2010

census). Cody is a cultural and industrial center for northern Wyoming and the Bighorn Canyon/Mountains. It lies seventy miles east of Yellowstone Park boundary.

• Founded by Buffalo Bill Cody, Cody lobbied for his town to become an eastern gateway to Yellowstone. Cody recognized the interconnectivity of the Bighorn Range to the Yellowstone ecosystem and economy. Cody is a popular stop en route to Yellowstone from the east (Devils Tower (WY), Custer State Park and Mt Rushmore and the Black Hills of South Dakota). Cody advocated for tourism to the area because his love of the land and an understanding of the delicate balance between tourism and the economic growth and vitality of this wild and beautiful territory (history meets economics and geography). Cody’s political lobbying paid off to make Cody the gateway to the eastern expanse of Yellowstone (Politics/Civics – Economy Tourism)

• Cody has successfully positioned its economy as a destination spot – with the internationally renowned Buffalo Bill Museum, Cody Night Rodeo, Fourth of July Celebrations and western character with new world flare.

Cody’s tourism helps bring Yellowstone’s economic impact to rural Northern Wyoming from Cody to Powell, to Greybull to Sheridan and beyond.

• Bozeman: the cultural and economic center of southwest Montana, Bozeman is home to Montana State University. Bozeman’s economy is intricately tied to the Yellowstone economy. Gallatin Field International Airport is the fastest growing airport in Montana. It is the primary airport for tourists launching YNP adventures. Car rentals are a major economic sector in Bozeman.

• Bozeman is located 90 miles from Yellowstone via either the Northern Entrance (Gardiner) or West Entrance (West Yellowstone)

• Bozeman is a center of culture and tourism. Main Street is home to numerous locally owned shops and restaurants. Recreational outfitters service the outdoor economy.

• Non-profits dedicated to Yellowstone, including EarthJustice, The Nature Conservancy, WWF, Yellowstone Association and Greater Yellowstone Coalition have offices in Bozeman and impact the local economy.

• Park tourism drives traffic to local summer events including The Sweet Pea Festival. In the winter, skiers descend on Bozeman due to its access to Big Sky and Bridger Bowl Ski Areas.

• Montana State University is a research center for studying park ecology and economics in the region.

Drinking Horse – a trail near Bozeman Sweet Pea Festival of the Arts -Bozeman

Civics and Politics in the Park

• Yellowstone is a hotbed for geysers and politics. Questions and debates over the role of government in managing our public lands remains a deep schism in political spheres.

• Growing political issues in the park:

• Funding: For two weeks in 2013, Yellowstone National Park was forced to close due to a government shutdown. This crippled the economy in the Greater Yellowstone region, particularly in Gardiner Montana and West Yellowstone. • Funding is a major point of contention in Congress. Parks are not receiving the

funding they need to run. Some politicians suggest privatizing the parks or selling off public lands. This has been thwarted by the resounding support of citizens in support of their parks.

Parks are economic drivers. Our national parks also deserve and require the environmental protection of the government. The role of this protection is debated. The delicate balance of economics and protecting the land is being threatened by exploitation and poor regulation, which hurts the free markets ability to stay healthy. Exploitation threatening the park includes:

- Geothermal mineral rights: seeking to open the park open for hydrothermal energy, which would decimate the natural ecosystem, while not having a lasting economic benefit.- Hydraulic Fracturing in the Beartooths and other areas around Yellowstone.

Yellowstone is a fragile ecosystem with a volatile geologic makeup. Fracturing threatens the ecosystem through pollution and earthquakes. Debate rages on the issue of fracturing in the region.

- Exploitation of an area does not mean a practice is always bad, we need alternative energy, but risking an entire ecosystem is not worth the price economically.

- Yellowstone’s Rivers help to pump moisture into the ecosystem, which helps to support agriculture. Montana is a leading wheat producer. There are more cattle in Montana than people!

Park issues:

• Delisting of the Grizzly Bear: Is a trophy hunt worth the economic reward of hunting fees? Grizzlies are not hunted for meat, but as trophy furs. Grizzlies are facing natural threats from Global Warming and loss of habitat – is a hunt necessary. The economic benefits of Grizzlies in their natural habitat is increased tourism dollars from wildlife viewers

• Gray Wolf – hunt or no hunt? Value to the economy or nuisance?

• Bison slaughter? Bison are being slaughtered because they carry brucellosis – yet there have been no cases in the wild of bison infecting cattle with brucellosis. Yet ranchers want bison to be culled and hazed out of the land (Paradise Valley). This unsound policy is rooted in history and misinformation as much as economics. Bison are viewed as competition to cattle. Ranchers want to protect their assets. The park service is criticized for allowing politics and pressure from a minority sector to affect the macro picture of the park. How can this be resolved in a way that is beneficial to ranchers and bison?

One journey’s end lead’s to another curiosity and a fork in another trailhead…• We have concluded our interdisciplinary study on the Geography,

History, Economics and Civics of Yellowstone. I hope you enjoyed trekking into the depths of Yellowstone.

• I hope you will continue on a journey of discovery into Yellowstone’s dynamic past, present and future.

• http://www.nps.gov/yell

Project:

• Several interdisciplinary projects (individual and group) can be applied to this curriculum.

• Project Proposal Example:

• Teams will create a business plan to open a tourism company in West Yellowstone giving tours to park tourists. The team will create a plan of an itinerary at Old Faithful. The tour will focus on the history and geography of the area. The project will also look at competitors, supply and demand and how to create a viable business in the area.

• Project Proposal

• Park citizens: students will research issues facing the park and use their position as a citizen to argue their stance. This can be a controversial issue or something innovative, for example you think the park should have a radio station with park programming including Shoshone music, lectures on history and geology. The student researches the economics and proposes their idea. This will utilize the disciplines of social sciences towards enacting change and working to protect and enhance our parks for the enjoyment and benefit of the people