Glacier Point Road set to close in 2021

Yosemite National Park is planning to close Glacier Point Road for the entire 2021 season to rebuild the road and add parking at a key trailhead, according to a new plan developed by the park.

The key stretch of road spans 10 miles from the Badger Pass Ski Area to Glacier Point. According to the plan, the roadway will be pulverized and repaved, in part to deal with heavy traffic and drainage issues in wet years, repair and partially straighten hairpin turns near Washburn Point, and to build a larger parking area with new vault toilets for the staging area and trailhead for Sentinel Dome/ Taft Point.

Glacier Point (7,214 feet) towers over Yosemite Valley (4,000 feet) and is one of the world’s greatest lookouts. It is directly across from 8,839foot Half Dome, with additional jawdropping views up the Merced River Canyon to Vernal and Nevada falls and adjacent Liberty Cap, up Tenaya Canyon and across the high country of the Clark and Cathedral ranges.

A trailhead nearby is available for the easy hikes to both Sentinel Dome, Taft Point and the Pohono Trail. Sentinel Dome towers over Yosemite Valley across to threetiered, 2,425foot Yosemite Falls, Taft Point is perched on an overlook next to a series of vertical fissures with a 3,000foot drop to the valley below, and the Pohono Trail traces the southern rim over Yosemite Valley.

In a big year for waterfalls, the park could get 5 million visitors, many who make the 32mile drive from Yosemite Valley to Glacier Point. They often have found long delays and no parking available. Shuttle buses, which once offered a tramlike experience, often have been jammed with so many people that the buses resembled cans packed with baby sardines.

The plan will be formally unveiled to the public at 4 p.m. Aug. 28 at the Oakhurst Community Center, said Jamie Richards at park headquarters.

After the closure through 2021, the plan describes that delays are likely in early summer of 2022 as the work is completed. No proposal of vehicle quotas, as some have suggested for Yosemite, Zion and Yellowstone national parks, is in the plan.