MAMMOTH, Wyo.—The National Park Service is seeking $134 million in improvements to visitor and employee lodging and a greater share of the revenue generated by tourists visiting and staying in Yellowstone National Park, according to a proposed 20-year concessionaire contract.
“We’re looking to replace or update our existing visitor facilities,” park spokesman Al Nash told The Billings Gazette (). “We’ve looked at where we wanted some of these facilities to be in the future, and we worked to devise a contract that we thought would offer a competitive business opportunity while achieving our goals for serving the American public.”
Xanterra Parks and Resorts has the current contract to run the park’s hotels, cabins and campgrounds along with 27 food and beverage outlets and nine retail locations. It expires in November 2013.
Xanterra spokesman Tom Mesereau said Wednesday the company is still reviewing the prospectus, which was issued in mid-May.
Xanterra’s gross revenues in the park increased from about $79 million in 2008 to more than $86 million in 2010. Yellowstone’s share, with a franchise fee of 2.5 percent, was $2.1 million in 2010. The park wants to raise the franchise fee to 6.8 percent.
The proposed improvements include upgrades to lodging and RV parks throughout Yellowstone along with existing food and beverage services.
Whoever wins the contract would be required to add rooms at Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel by converting space now used for administrative functions and by renovating 14 cabins used by employees for visitor use. The hotel also would have to be open year-round instead of just summer and winter.
At the Old Faithful Snow Lodge, the new concessionaire would be required to build a 77-room employee dormitory and convert 67 cabins now used by workers to be rented out to visitors. Improvements also would be required at Lake Yellowstone Hotel, Canyon Lodge and Lake Lodge including the rehabilitation of 19 cabins, the relocation of 15 more and demolishing an employee dorm and replacing it with a 60-room dorm.
The projects, estimated to cost $134 million, would have to be completed between 2015 and 2018, Nash said.
“We’re going to require the successful bidder to put in a substantial amount of money in the early years of the contract to address the real needs,” Nash said. “It’s money we’d be less likely to find through federal appropriations. We felt … this long-term contract was a mechanism to encourage prospective bidders that there are good business opportunities here.”
Some are concerned the improvements could change the now rugged experience of Yellowstone into a more refined and upscale outing with higher costs.
“One of the comments we hear back is a concern on how expensive it’s getting to stay in the park,” said Mark Pearson, conservation director for the Bozeman, Mont.-based Greater Yellowstone Coalition.
“The thing that catches your attention in the plan is how they talk about the various improvements resulting in a higher average daily rate for lodging to make it more appealing for someone to bid on these contracts,” Pearson said.
Nash said price increases are possible as the cost of doing business goes up, but he said he expects inflationary price increases over the next 20 years anyway.
“The contract requires (the concessionaire) to apply to the Park Service for any rate changes,” Nash said. “We have entire oversight over the charges that concessionaires operate, what services they offer and what products they offer for service, and we managed the rates.”
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Information from: The Billings Gazette,
