Montana’s Glacier National Park is an iconic landscape. Its mountains, alpine lakes, and wildlife attract millions of visitors a year. The park has faced overcrowding and parking challenges for years, but a recent policy change is frustrating visitors and causing access issues.
Previous Policy
In recent years, Glacier National Park has often topped 3 million visitors annually. To deal with crowds, the park implemented a day-use reservation system from 2021 to 2024. Essentially, visitors had to reserve the day they’d enter the park in advance.
Then, in 2025, the park piloted a timed-entry system that was already in use at parks like Yosemite and Arches. To enter the park via car, you make a reservation online for a 2-hour window on a specific day for a nonrefundable fee of $2. Once you enter the park, you can stay as long as you’d like.
New Policy
For 2026, the National Park Service (NPS) scrapped timed entry at Yosemite, Arches, and Glacier, turning entry into a free-for-all. As peak summer tourist season ramped up, the lack of any system began to produce long lines and traffic at Yosemite.
Now it seems like Glacier is dealing with the same issues. According to the most up-to-date numbers from the NPS, visitation in Glacier was up 5.5% in April and 9.63% overall compared to last year’s numbers.
In anticipation of crowds, Glacier unveiled a new shuttle system and parking regulations for this summer. The parking lot at Logan Pass is located on the popular Going to the Sun Road. It also provides access to the 11.8-mile Highline Trail, one of the park’s most iconic hikes that is widely considered a “must-do.”
The park added a 3-hour time parking limit at the Logan Pass lot. Of course, a 12-mile hike takes longer than 3 hours. If visitors want to do the Highline Trail, they have to park elsewhere and take a park shuttle to the area.
The shuttle requires tickets: It will not transport visitors without them. Visitors can reserve tickets online on recreation.gov for a $1 processing fee. The shuttle also provides access to other popular areas like the Loop and Rising Sun.
The Problem
In theory, using a shuttle system to prevent congestion and parking issues makes sense: Many popular parks (including Bryce Canyon and Zion) use shuttle systems. While the busy summer season can produce lines for these shuttles, visitors do not have to reserve their spot in advance.
But the reality for visitors to Glacier has become a nightmare. Some of the tickets go live 60 days in advance and are available on a first-come, first-served basis. As soon as the clock hits 8 a.m. Mountain Time, people rush to the site. This system means getting access to Logan Pass has become a question of who has the fastest internet and can click through the site the quickest.
The other portion of tickets goes live the night before at 7 p.m. This can present challenges for people already in the park. If you’re camping or in a remote area, you may not have adequate internet access. If you’re coming from out of state or out of the country, it’s risky to make a bet that you can get tickets the night before when they’re so in demand.
People on the internet have reported outrage with trying to get a shuttle ticket. “What the actual hell? I had my Logan Pass shuttle tickets queued up, ready to go when the tickets opened, and BAM — sold out in less than 30 seconds,” someone said on Reddit. People said that it took multiple days and multiple attempts before they snagged a ticket.
There also seems to be confusion online about whether or not people need a shuttle ticket. If you want to park at Logan Pass, you still can, but only for a maximum of 3 hours. A lack of clarity around the subject appears to be causing people who don’t necessarily need tickets to obtain them anyway, further clogging up the system.
A recent report by Re:Public Media and Wired shows that frustration and difficulties using recreation.gov are widespread. Bots seem to be snatching up in-demand campsites and reservations across the country.
While the timed-entry system also certainly had its flaws, this system seems almost designed to fail. Why designate a 3-hour parking limit for a lot that provides access to a trail that people — by definition — will take longer than 3 hours to complete?
The park is already congested, and it is not yet peak season. Glacier can expect over 700,000 visitors a month in July and August, only further increasing demand for these coveted shuttle tickets. In an email to GearJunkie, park staff said the shuttle can accommodate around 700 to 800 people per day.
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