Colorado fourteeners see record decline in visitors, new report shows

BY PARKER YAMASAKI THE COLORADO SUN

Foot tra c on Colorado’s highest peaks tumbled 33% in 2022 from the record 415,000 hiker days logged in 2020.

e annual Hiking Use Estimates report by the Colorado Fourteeners Initiative recorded an estimated 279,000 hiker use days during the 2022 season. at’s about 24,000 fewer hikers than in 2021, which saw 303,000 hiker days, and a dramatic drop from 2020’s record of 415,000 hiker days.

ough some ebbs and ows are expected in hiker data due to drought or snowpack, Lloyd Athearn, executive director of the Colorado Fourteeners Initiative, worries that the last year’s decrease is in part an overreaction to the high-tra c pandemic year.

For instance, in 2021, Clear Creek County posted “No Parking” signs along the road that people traditionally parked along to access Grays and Torreys peaks. And in 2022 a reservation system was in e ect for the full season on Quandary, the fourteener