Recreation and Tourism Trends on the Colorado Plateau

During the latter part of this century, particularly the last 25 years, many of the natural areas of the Colorado Plateau have experienced a dramatic increase in recreational use. Recreation is today a major land use on the plateau, with land managers addressing recreation as well as more traditional land uses such as grazing, mining, and logging in the management of the region's vast public lands. Areas that were once only rarely visited are now draw large numbers of people from around the nation and the world. In Canyonlands National Park, once one of the least-visited and isolated areas of the plateau's canyon country, the number of backpackers traveling in the park's backcountry has increased from less than 10,000 in 1970 to nearly 80,000 in 1992.

Visits to all 27 National Park Service units on the Colorado Plateau increased an astonishing 94% between 1981 and 1994. Grand Canyon National Park, the Colorado Plateau's most spectacular natural feature, is also its most popular. Visitation at the park has steadily grown with a major increase in visitation occurring in the 1960s. The number of visitors to the park has more than quadrupled since 1960 and nearly doubled since 1980.