New residents. New visitors. Old visitors returning. Mild weather (at least most of the time). Don’t forget the pandemic. It all adds up to a continuing escalation of numbers at Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.  

The park is closing in on its totals for 2021, and it looks to be another banner year. “Through November, we were just 10,000 short of our all-time record,” says Scott Tucker, superintendent at the National Lakeshore. This month’s mild weather has him confident that the record for the year will be broken, if it hasn’t been broken already. “December last year had 23,000 (visitors), so it’s pretty easy to say we’ll have it.”

Last year, the Lakeshore saw 1,718,696 visitors, an all-time high, and an increase over the previous year’s total of 1,570,001. The numbers for 2019 were actually down from the three years prior, which all saw more than 1.6 million visitors.

Compare that with the Lakeshore’s first year of operation, when it had 696,600 visitors. Or even a decade later: 1986 was the last year it was under a million, at 634,435.

What does it all mean? For one thing, those numbers can stress the systems, infrastructure and resources, natural and otherwise, at the lakeshore. Tucker says the fact that July and August numbers were down while the shoulder seasons were up helps to mitigate that. “The visitors were [more] spread out,” he says.

In the heart of summer, the overall number of visitors spiked last year, from 499,376 and 397,417 in July and August 2019 to 592,404 and 490,098 for the same months last year. In 2021 they settled in at 481,137 and 408,715 respectively.

Tucker speculates that was because the pandemic eased and subsequent restrictions were relaxed. Visitors had more options this past summer than they did in 2020. “Last summer … maybe they came here four times over seven days. This year, maybe they came two times, then went to a vineyard, Traverse City, Petoskey – there were more things open.”

Which is a good thing on many levels. It not only spreads the wealth, boosting the economic fortunes of more businesses, it also allows the park to do more maintenance and try to keep up rather than catch up. He says once things were opened up, summer 2020 pushed the limits of the National Lakeshore’s resources, from staffing to parking lots, cleaning restrooms and collecting trash.

The ever-increasing numbers also can and do stress nearby communities. The Sleeping Bear Gateways Council works to address the infrastructure needs of the villages and businesses within 60 miles of the Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. The areas of Frankfort and Elberta, Empire and Glen Arbor, and Thompsonville were a primary focus. Mike Rivard, the president of the council since its inception in 2018, says there are numerous opportunities and challenges associated with being next to a national park, monument or shoreline.

“There’s congestion in the summer. Especially in small communities that can be a challenge,” Rivard says.

One other factor in usage is the weather. Tucker says the mild weather so far this fall and winter has produced higher numbers, though those who want to experience the lakeshore in the snow have not yet had the opportunity. “It (weather) dictates what recreation happens. A big piece is cross country skiing. They’re chomping at the bit to groom the Heritage Trail,” he says.

As anyone who has seen the signs in restaurants, retail shops and elsewhere knows, there is a lack of workers, especially seasonal workers. That is in part due to the lack of seasonal workforce housing, an area Rivard says the council is trying to address. Last year it took a survey of businesses to try to enumerate the need, and the employers responding to the survey estimated that about 27 percent of seasonal employees need to secure housing while they are doing seasonal work. Projecting the responses to all businesses in the area, there’s a need for an additional 1,000 beds. “That’s a huge gap. It affects the service quality,” he said.

The council applied for and received a USDA grant, along with matching funds from Rotary Charities and the Grand Traverse Regional Foundation, for the survey and the study. As a result, it was able to hire Frankfort resident Elise Crafts to serve as project manager for a grant-funded Seasonal Workforce Housing Project. Crafts is a certified community planner and developer who operates her own firm, Statecraft. She has assisted Mancelona, Elk Rapids, Grand Traverse County and other communities in project planning and implementation.

Rivard knows there are no easy answers. Housing is a problem for year-round residents, not just those who want to be here seasonally. It’s exacerbated by the fact that those who would rent out a home can typically realize more though AirBNB or VRBO on a weekly basis than they’d make over an entire summer. In addition to working with Crafts, he says the organization is working with Housing North on a number of options, including camper campgrounds and a housing exchange program.

The council is also working on two other projects. One is the development of a visitors’ center in Benzie County that would introduce people to the National Lakeshore who enter from the south. While a number of people come into the area from M-72 to the east, a significant number drive into it from places like Muskegon, Holland and Manistee, and Rivard says they may not even realize they’re in the National Lakeshore area until they reach Empire. He says such an endeavor would allow for a presence for other non-profits and the Park Service. “There are a lot of Benzie organizations interested,” he says.

The third is engaging with stakeholders throughout the area to work on providing positive experiences for all those who engage with the National Lakeshore, whether visitors, residents, or workers. He said it is essential to work with the various municipalities to address the many challenges. “We’re an advocacy group. We have no staff, no money, we’re volunteers. We want to create a dialog. Municipalities control zoning and policies.”