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Labor Shortage Prompts Closure of Some Glacier National Park Campgrounds

Like many businesses within the Flathead Valley, Glacier National Park (Montana) isn’t immune to staff shortages. The park usually employs around 16 seasonal staffers to run and supervise its front country campgrounds.

But according to a report, the park has only half of that this year, spokeswoman Brandy Burke confirmed.

As such, some well-known campgrounds in Glacier are not opening this year, including Avalanche Creek campground and the remote and often quiet Cut Bank campground. 

Glacier has also gone to a reservation system for a few campgrounds. Apgar and Fish Creek campgrounds are now on a reservation basis during peak summer months, though Apgar is open all year with no reservations in the fall, winter, and most of the spring.

In Many Glacier, it’s half reservations and half first come, first served, while St. Mary is all reservations.

St. Mary is typically open throughout the year, but in late August, it reverted to a first-come, first-served basis.

The Bowman Lake and Two Medicine campgrounds are also on a first-come-first-served basis. 

Bowman visitation has been light this year as the park implemented a reservation system to get into the Polebridge Entrance. However, if a visitor informs the park they want to camp at Bowman and a site is available, they can get one at the entrance.

On the east side, Two Medicine is also a first-come, first-serve campground and has yet to sell out this season, Burke noted.

A portion of the Rising Sun campground was expected to open soon.

Glacier has also implemented a new system whereby conditions for campgrounds, trails, and roads will be updated directly to a person’s phone via text message.

For more information, visit https://www.nps.gov/glac/planyourvisit/camping.htm.

This story originally appeared on Hungry Horse News

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Hi, you might find this article from Modern Campground interesting: Labor Shortage Prompts Closure of Some Glacier National Park Campgrounds! This is the link: https://moderncampground.com/usa/montana/labor-shortage-prompts-closure-of-some-glacier-national-park-campgrounds/