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White Mountain National Forest Parking Fees

The White Mountain National Forest is participating in the national recreation fee demonstration program created by Congress in 1996 (PL 104-134) to test ways for users to help finance the activities they enjoy. The White Mountain program charges for parking in designated areas, mostly trailheads for hiking and ski touring. Areas requiring a parking pass are signed as fee areas, unless the sign is missing or covered with snow.

Official WMNF explanation

How Much is the Fee?

• If you buy a Parking Pass in advance, there are three options:
  • $5 per week
  • $20 per year
  • $25 per year for two cars in the same household

  The pass must be permanently affixed to the windshield and may not be transferred (ask Forest Service for procedure if you crack your windshield or trade cars).

• Many popular sites have a fee tube where you can deposit $3 per day instead. This fee is now valid anywhere for that day in case your preferred site has no fee tube or you wish to visit multiple sites such as a tour of the Kancamagus Highway.

• Effective April 2003, holders of the Golden Eagle Pass with hologram, Golden Age or Golden Access cards are exempt from paying the fee. Cards must be left visible on the dashboard of the parked vehicle.

• You do not need a Parking Pass while performing approved volunteer work on the Forest, and you supposedly get a complimentary Parking Pass if you do 16 hours of approved volunteer work. This is not a high hourly wage, but it is a nice perk for people who were already doing volunteer work.

Where Are Passes Sold?

Forest Service offices, outdoor equipment stores, general stores near the Forest, etc.

Pass vendor list from Forest Service, last updated May 2004.

On-line ordering is not available, but mail order is.

Where is the Fee Required?

The original statement was "unattended parking anywhere on National Forest land, except areas already under special use permit."

After a trial period this was modified to exclude areas where people stop only briefly, such as viewpoints and visitor centers, and also some roadsides used for dispersed hunting and fishing. The principal payers are now hikers and cross-country skiers. Even so, only about half of what people think of as National Forest trailheads charge a fee because either the National Forest doesn't own the land (Franconia Notch, Appalachia, etc.) or it is already under a special use permit (Mount Tecumseh ski area, A.M.C. Pinkham Notch, etc.).

The Forest Service does not publish a list of where fees are required, but only National Forest lands where parking passes are not required. A place not on the list is:

• an area where a parking fee is required
  or
• an area under special use permit where a parking pass is not required, although in campgrounds for instance you pay a camping fee instead
  or
• not National Forest land and hence not a WMNF fee area, of course the landowner may charge their own fee not covered by a WMNF pass

You can't tell which from this web site.

What Does the Money Go For?

These last two sections are only about politics and not hiking.

By law, 80% of the money is retained by the Forest for local use, with the other 20% for overhead and vendor commissions.

While the general WMNF web site says the money is used "to maintain and enhance the locations requiring a pass," the FY2003 report shows that these are only part of the uses.

• Some of the money was used to staff Forest Service offices, which benefits users of both fee and non-fee locations.
• Some of the money was used for interpretive programs at campgrounds which might more logically come from camping fees.
• Many of the trail projects were in areas not covered by the fee collection system.

The language in the report is a more lenient Fees collected are used to repair, maintain and improve recreation sites and facilities to provide the best possible service to people who use and enjoy the White Mountain National Forest.

What Do Visitors Think of the Program?

Most Forest visitors have come to accept the program, although there are occasional incidents of civil disobedience.

• Visitors from out of state are often accustomed to paying for parking back home and the fee is only a tiny part of the cost of their trip.
• Residents of the counties around the Forest are generally unhappy. They are not used to paying for parking anywhere and feel that the Forest is not paying its fair share of local expenses.
• New Hampshire politicians are also unhappy as the fee may discourage tourists. There may also be an unfavorable comparison to Vermont (which New Hampshire sneers at as being spendthrift for having both sales and income taxes), yet the Green Mountain National Forest avoided parking fees by cutting middle management instead. (The GMNF also has much lower camping fees.)
• Some national environmental organizations are opposed to the nationwide fee demo as the beginning of privatization of public lands.

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