Destruction of National Parks
As discussed in the assigned reading for module two “Harden 1968: The Tragedy of The Commons” the author touches on the negative impacts of treating the worlds National Parks as common property (see page 3, paragraph 4). This section of the reading peaked my interest because I am an individual who greatly enjoys going on hikes and taking in the Earth’s natural beauty. For this reason I decided to do some further research on this topic.
Harden suggests a few ideas on what to do about this problem and mentions allocating certain rights upon entry to the parks. As we know, this is being done today, there are many rules and regulations on what is and is not allowed to be done at a National Park such as, littering, extracting resources for personal use, etc (see Canada’s National Park Rules and Regulations at https://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca/eng/regulations/SOR-78-213/FullText.html). However, even though these are set in place, Natural Parks around the world are still experiencing catastrophic damage.
As Lauren Finnessey of Johnson & Whale University stated in her thesis “Parks in the United States” the three main negative impacts caused by tourists are:
“depletion of national resources, pollution, and physical impacts. Tourism generates land degradation, air and noise pollution, littering, trampling and the alternation of ecosystems. All of these areas of impact not only risk the well being of the land, but also the species that call these areas home (Environmental).”
Finnessey, (L), 2012, ‘The Negative Effect of Tourism on National Parks in the United States’, Bachelor of Science, Johnson & Whales University, Providence, RI.
It is clear that continuing at this rate of destruction, soon there will be nothing beautiful to see or protect in the worlds astonishing parks. With this being said, a question that must be answered immediately is “what is the next step?” Should the government change the National Parks from being common property to something else and regulate the amount of visitors each year? Should there be a new land tenure and land management system put in place? Should fines for disobeying the rules and regulations already in place be larger? I am not able to make these decisions but, I think something needs to be done in regards to how this land is treated immediately.
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Dylan's Thoughts 
Very interesting, to answer one of your questions at the end I feel it would be very difficult to limit the amount of people who are allowed to visit these parks every year. During the summer, tourists may travel great distances to see these parks and if they arrive only to be told “Sorry, we’ve reached our capacity for visitors this year.” they would be extremely disappointed consider the amount of money they spent just to arrive to the destination. Also, if these parks costs admission to enter they would lose a lot of money by limiting the visitors. This would lead to the cost of admission increasing resulting in less visitors.
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