In addition to site-specific user fees, the agency also charges fees for some interpretive programs, also administered under the regional umbrella of the rec fee demo program. Take, for example, a parking area near Kenosha Pass, serving a trailhead for the Colorado Trail. The site is managed by the Pike-San Isabel's South Platte Ranger District and includes a busy restroom, along with a short stretch of interpretive trail. But Steve Priest, the district's recreation forester, says that area is run by the same private concessionaire who leases the Forest Service campground on the other side of the highway. Priest says the fee at the area has been very controversial.
People have a hard time understanding why they have to pay just to use a toilet.
Responding to numerous complaints from the public, Priest says the Forest Service is negotiating with the concessionaire to put an end to the fee. He says there have also been some talks with state officials about developing an official rest area near the pass. The Forest Service says it needs the fees to properly manage the skyrocketing demand for recreation on the National Forests. The agency's recreation budgets have not kept pace with increasing visitation, or even with the cost of wages and general inflation, Priest and other Forest Service recreation managers say. I think that as people get frustrated with the congestion on I-70, they're looking at other ways to get into the mountains.