Fall is a beautiful but busy time in the Smokies. Great Smoky Mountains National Park visitors should plan their trips and expect crowds, traffic congestion and limited parking throughout the park. 

The annual “Youth Arts Festival” will be held from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 21, at the Jackson County Green Energy Park in Dillsboro. 

In the first year since Great Smoky Mountains National Park launched the Park it Forward program, the fee has generated over $10 million in revenue, which includes parking tag sales and camping fees.

The Great Smoky Mountains National Park has earned this one for its decision to begin charging for parking, effective March 1 this year. 

When new fees went into effect  in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park March 1, park managers were expecting limited revenues and limited compliance during their inaugural year enforcing the Smokies’ first-ever parking fee. But four months in, both metrics are coming in higher than anticipated. 

After years of inaction by Congress led to a massive $262 million deferred maintenance backlog in America’s most-visited national park, it will now be up to visitors to pony up their own money to support the park’s most basic staffing and maintenance needs.

Starting March 1, any vehicle parked in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park for more than 10 minutes must display a valid parking tag as the “Park it Forward” program takes effect. 

On the same day her concerns about a parking issue were published, a Waynesville Cemetery Committee whistleblower resigned after the committee’s chair chastised her via email and made problematic comments about the First Amendment, public records laws and open meetings statutes.

Haywood County residents have always been very protective — and particular — about Waynesville’s historic Green Hill Cemetery, but at least one member of the Waynesville Cemetery Committee is looking to head off disaster before it becomes another public relations nightmare.

Starting March 1, Great Smoky Mountains National Park visitors will have to pay to park. As the date approaches and annual parking tags go on sale, park management is working to iron out the details and communicate them to the public.