FILE: Despite a timed entry, cars line up at the entrance to Arches National Park on Oct. 3, 2023, near Moab, Utah.
FILE: Despite a timed entry, cars line up at the entrance to Arches National Park on Oct. 3, 2023, near Moab, Utah.
Moab will soon be launching a long-discussed pilot shuttle for Arches National Park, allowing visitors to grab a fare-free bus from town to ride into and around the park. Proponents say the plan will ease congestion and support local business, but opposition to the project has become so bitter that nearly half of the Grand County Commission, the county’s legislative body, recently walked out of a meeting about how best to fund the proposal.
Residents are similarly divided, and tensions in the tight-knit gateway town of 5,200 people have only grown in recent weeks.
At every turn, votes related to the pilot have been split between opposing factions. Commission Chair Melodie McCandless, Vice Chair Bill Winfield, and Commissioners Mike McCurdy and Brian Martinez support the project and have largely overseen its development and implementation. The remainder of the commission, Trish Hedin, Mary McGann and Jacques Hadler, say the process has been needlessly rushed and have raised questions about the project’s cost, resourcing, liability and safety.
“The timeline is entirely self-imposed, and the rollout has been sloppy,” Hedin told SFGATE. “I would absolutely support a project like this, but it’s just been this shell game as to where the money is supposed to come from.”
FILE: Zion National Park operates a mandatory shuttle bus system for visitors to access the Zion Canyon Scenic Drive in Zion National Park, Utah.
FILE: Zion National Park operates a mandatory shuttle bus system for visitors to access the Zion Canyon Scenic Drive in Zion National Park, Utah.
The pilot was first proposed by Martinez and has been approved in stages throughout 2026. A shuttle program has been floated for Arches at least seven times since 1999, but gained renewed traction after the National Park Service chose not to enforce timed entry in 2026. As a result, visitation has climbed by about 4% compared with this time last year. While congestion within the park hasn’t rivaled that of other locations that also did away with timed entry such as Yosemite National Park, there have been periods where visitors reported long entry lines and overflowing parking lots.
The pilot is being run as a partnership between the Park Service and Grand County, where Arches is located. The pair will provide $1.5 million and $500,000, respectively, while a $1 million grant from the Utah Department of Transportation brings the total budget to $3 million. The commission approved its own $500,000 contribution on May 19.
One explanation for the apparent haste is that the funds committed by the Park Service have a time limit. According to an FAQ document from the county, the Park Service funds “must be obligated by the end of fiscal year 2026 — September 30, 2026” and require a 1-to-1 nonfederal match.
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On Aug. 4, the commission met to finalize its agreement with the park and with Via Transportation, a New York City-based transportation company that will provide the day-to-day service.
Just half an hour before the meeting, however, commissioners also received an updated report detailing how the county would meet its financial contribution, which totals $500,000. After initially planning to pull the funding from the county’s transient room tax mitigation fund — a tax collected on hotel rooms — the new, 25-page draft instead drew $350,000 from Fund 47, a restricted local government account that finances public transportation, roads, pedestrian safety, and recreation infrastructure like local bike paths and trail maintenance.
FILE: Crowds walk the trail at Double Arch on Oct. 7, 2023, near Moab, Utah.
FILE: Crowds walk the trail at Double Arch on Oct. 7, 2023, near Moab, Utah.
The difference, Hedin said, is that the county’s portion is now almost entirely funded by local taxpayer dollars, rather than from taxes collected from visitors, who will almost certainly be the ones to benefit most from the shuttles. It’s also unclear how such a large sum, which amounts to roughly one-third of the fund’s total as of late 2025, will impact future projects across Moab.
After several members raised concerns about how they could be expected to review such a lengthy document in so little time, the commission recessed for 10 minutes. An argument later erupted when commissioners were then asked to vote on the document rather than postpone the vote for a later special session. After Vice Chair Winfield convened the vote over the objections of three of the body’s members, Hedin, McGann, and Hadler gathered their things and walked out. Hadler abstained from voting as he left, while Hedin and McGann said nothing.
Martinez did not respond to a request for comment, but others on the commission have spoken out in local publications.
In an op-ed published Aug. 12, Hadler apologized for his behavior but restated that the expectations placed on the commission were unfair. “I never expected to walk out of a commission meeting like I did the other night, but everyone has a breaking point and Commissioner Winfield pushed me past mine,” he said, later adding “it’s impossible to exaggerate how toxic the environment has become.”
FILE: Crowded motor home campers on vacation in the southwest U.S. in Arches National Park near Moab, Utah.
FILE: Crowded motor home campers on vacation in the southwest U.S. in Arches National Park near Moab, Utah.
Despite the walk-out, the funding agreement passed by a 4-3 vote. Via Transportation is now moving forward with hiring, even as the final details of its contract are still being hammered out.
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Based on the request for proposals published by the county, the shuttle will operate seven days a week from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m., departing Moab every half hour. The Arches Visitor Center will serve as the main transfer hub, and within the park, additional buses will increase the ride frequency to every 15 minutes. Riders must have a valid entry pass to board.
Service is planned to run through Oct. 31, then resume March 1 through June 30, 2027. The county and the Park Service will evaluate the pilot’s initial success by Nov. 16, after which they may be able to extend it for two more one-year terms if they can identify additional funding.
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