Yellowstone National Park announced record-breaking visitation for the month of October. The park said that it hosted 360,034 recreation visits in October 2020, up 110% from October 2019, and up from the previous October record of 252,013 in 2015.
The park was closed due to health and safety reasons related to COVID-19 beginning March 24, 2020. Two Wyoming entrances opened on May 18 and three Montana entrances opened on June 1, 2020. All five entrances opened on June 1, so despite the record-breaking October, the parks-year-to-date visitation is still behind the previous five years.
“So far in 2020, the park has hosted 3,743,907 recreation visits, down 6% from the same period last year,” a Yellowstone statement said Thursday.
The list below, provided by Yellowstone National Park, shows the year-to-date trend for recreation visits over the last several years (through October):
- 2020 – 3,743,907
- 2019 – 3,979,153
- 2018 – 4,078,771
- 2017 – 4,084,762
- 2016 – 4,212,782
- 2015 – 4,066,191
