Project overview: Improve visitor access and operational efficiency by exploring how license plate reader (LPR) cameras can potentially help automate the park’s entry/exit process, understand visitor behavior patterns, and ease traffic at entrance gates.

How your support helps: Yosemite National Park welcomes millions of visitors each year, but the park lacks an efficient way to process visitors at entrance stations. As a result, in the busy season, long lines form at entrance stations, and visitors often must wait up to multiple hours to enter Yosemite. 

This project aims to improve the visitor experience by leveraging available technology to process and sort cars at entrance stations automatically. Using license-plate reader technology, park managers hope to speed up entry times and automate reservation monitoring. This real-time data, collected from approximately 50 license plate reader cameras located at up to 15 locations in and around the park, will vastly improve the visitor experience by reducing wait times at entrance gates and enabling alternate fee payment methods. 

Yosemite will continue to attract more and more visitors each year. With your support, we can make a positive impact on their visit and improve working conditions at our entrance stations with accurate, detailed information will support the park’s management decisions on visitor access, reservations, traffic patterns, and closures. 

This year: In 2026, the National Park Service hopes to explore ways that license plate readers can help the park collect fees at all hours of the day and potentially help automate the entrance/exit process. As the third year of this multi-year project, staff will build on the successes and lessons from previous years to increase capacity, capture vehicles with greater accuracy, address data management challenges, and develop data visualization tools to inform management decisions.

Project partner: Yosemite National Park