Let’s begin with the actual shockers: Yellowstone, Yosemite, and Zion don’t even break the highest 10 in a brand new rating of U.S. nationwide parks. Can we even belief an inventory that places these unbelievable locations in the course of the pack? We’ll allow you to resolve.
In celebration of Nationwide Park Week 2024, an internet journey information firm referred to as Journey Lemming launched its up to date listing of greatest U.S. nationwide parks for 2024. The staff calculated every park’s general rating primarily based on its common rating throughout seven classes: crowds, opinions, climate, affordability, jobs, accessibility, and biodiversity.
We’ll talk about extra about methodology later. For now, let’s get to the rankings.
Journey Lemming’s Rating of the U.S.’s 63 Nationwide Parks
- Shenandoah Nationwide Park
- Joshua Tree Nationwide Park
- Olympic Nationwide Park
- Nice Smoky Mountains Nationwide Park
- North Cascades Nationwide Park
- Grand Canyon Nationwide Park
- Channel Islands Nationwide Park
- New River Gorge Nationwide Park
- Everglades Nationwide Park
- Redwood Nationwide Park
- Cuyahoga Valley Nationwide Park
- Saguaro Nationwide Park
- Large Bend Nationwide Park
- Hawai’i Volcanoes Nationwide Park
- Dying Valley Nationwide Park
- Yellowstone Nationwide Park
- Mount Rainier Nationwide Park
- Zion Nationwide Park
- Kenai Fjords Nationwide Park
- Haleakalā Nationwide Park
- Capitol Reef Nationwide Park
- Sequoia Nationwide Park
- Yosemite Nationwide Park
- Grand Teton Nationwide Park
- Carlsbad Caverns Nationwide Park
- Canyonlands Nationwide Park
- Dry Tortugas Nationwide Park
- Biscayne Nationwide Park
- Indiana Dunes Nationwide Park
- White Sands Nationwide Park
- Pinnacles Nationwide Park
- Mammoth Cave Nationwide Park
- Arches Nationwide Park
- Rocky Mountain Nationwide Park
- Badlands Nationwide Park
- Congaree Nationwide Park
- Kings Canyon Nationwide Park
- Glacier Bay Nationwide Park and Protect
- Lassen Volcanic Nationwide Park
- Bryce Canyon Nationwide Park
- Acadia Nationwide Park
- Crater Lake Nationwide Park
- Katmai Nationwide Park and Protect
- Denali Nationwide Park and Protect
- Petrified Forest Nationwide Park
- Glacier Nationwide Park
- Gateway Arch Nationwide Park
- Nice Sand Dunes Nationwide Park and Protect
- Sizzling Springs Nationwide Park
- Black Canyon of the Gunnison Nationwide Park
- Voyageurs Nationwide Park
- Guadalupe Mountains Nationwide Park
- Mesa Verde Nationwide Park
- Nice Basin Nationwide Park
- Wrangell-St. Elias Nationwide Park and Protect
- Lake Clark Nationwide Park and Protect
- Isle Royale Nationwide Park
- Theodore Roosevelt Nationwide Park
- Virgin Islands Nationwide Park
- Wind Cave Nationwide Park
- American Samoa Nationwide Park
- Gates of the Arctic Nationwide Park and Protect
- Kobuk Valley Nationwide Park
The place does your favourite park fall on the listing?
Methodology
Journey Lemming explains its methodology fairly extensively, detailing all seven classes and the way they calculated a rating for every one.
As an example, they took into consideration how crowded parks are by dividing the overall recreation visits in 2023 by the variety of sq. acres. They decided a “opinions” rating by taking the typical user-review rating from a number of sources, together with Google, Yelp, and TripAdvisor.
Additionally they thought-about common month-to-month temperature and precipitation, plus the chance for excessive climate to find out every park’s “climate” rating, and so they calculated affordability partially by digging up the Nationwide Park Service’s stories on whole customer spending per park.
A brand new class added in 2024 is “jobs.” Journey Lemming says it calculated every park’s jobs rating by wanting on the variety of jobs every park creates. That is an try to gauge how considerably the park economically advantages the group round it.
For accessibility, the researchers checked out how straightforward or tough it’s to entry the park. This class seemingly pulled the general rating down for gorgeous parks that require a helicopter or ferry to entry, like Alaska’s distant Kobuk Valley Nationwide Park, which got here in final place.
The ultimate class that contributed to this yr’s nationwide park rating is biodiversity. Journey Lemming gave a rating on this class primarily based on the overall variety of species current in every park.
What do you suppose? Will you select your subsequent nationwide park journey primarily based on this rating?
