Baker Overnight Parking Fee

In case you missed it, Mt. Baker has quietly started charging $10/night to park your RV/camper/van overnight. This is not surprising, and despite any sort of hook-ups/amenities, 100% legal & enforceable at the lower, White Salmon base area as they own the land that lot is on. However, I wonder how they're able to pull it off at Heather Meadows. Do they require you to park your vehicle on resort property? My understanding is that they cannot charge for parking, day or overnight, in the big lot adjacent to Mt. Herman because that is forest service land (albeit leased & cleared by the ski area).

What if I want to park my vehicle overnight in the main HM lot and go camp at Artist Point overnight? Am I going to be charged $10/night for every night I stay out there? How will they enforce it if nobody's around to pay? It's a ridiculous policy and I personally believe if we let them get away with it now, it'll only be a slippery slope to charging non-resort visitors for day access, too.

Taking a page from the Crystal B lot playbook, sounds like.

At some point somethings going to have to been done to try and reduce the volume of vehicles headed up to Baker (and every other ski area for that matter). With a parking fee being the obvious solution.

Eldora ski area in CO just tried to implement a $20 fee for any vehicle with less than 3 passengers and everyone freaked out. Too bad....seems like a necessary evil at some point.

www.5280.com/2018/12/eldora-rescinds-pro...fter-major-backlash/

Baker (the ski area) seems sort of screwed in that plowing takes place both privately and by the DOT. And the large lot at heather meadows seems to have a different designation that other parts of the resort (I've been told other private groups like the Mountaineers contributed significant funds to the expansion of that lot at one point in time). Considering how pissed off the ski area is about other users it's very telling they have no policy or information online regarding the situation.

Squaw Valley main lot: $30.00 with less than 3 people
This sort of stuff is not an issue for Kyle Miller 😂.
However, the snow pack sounds so sketchy up there
at Baker. See Grant Gunderson's post on Instagram.
He got hosed from above by snow that was already blasted and
skied by patrol. It broke 4' to the ground and swept him over a
rocky drop. The possible trigger was placing a piece of
Rock marking bamboo in the snow.
Take care all and be please be patient.

I can see charging for parking if space is limited to encourage carpooling, but charging people for parking overnight, without providing services, seems like it would do little to alleviate the supposed problem. I don't know what percentage of parking is used by campers but with the exception of some holiday periods it's probably pretty small, judging by what I have seen (but I'm rarely out on weekends and holidays so my perception is probably limited). It should be noted that some if not all people camping are paying customers of the ski area and that there are environmental and traffic benefits from people staying overnight rather than driving back and forth. So to me these overnight fees appear to simply be a money grab without any benefit to the public or the paying customer.

www.mtbaker.us/ski-area-info/travel-info/overnight-parking

It does seem strange to charge the campers $10/night since they are most likely to be buying lift tickets and food or have a season pass.  The campers have become a significant impact on the parking in the HM upper lot but the biggest problem is really the backcountry skiers that show up before the parking attendants and park all over the place leaving really inefficient use of space.  If the ski area would pay their attendants an extra hour or two each they could get some order in that lot early and make a lot of space for their paying customers that show up at 9am.

I've been told that they've tried to be creative about expanding the parking but every direction they could go from where they are now results in environmental impact that would be difficult to mitigate.  It's a tricky problem for everyone.

Personally I think they should charge a toll for every car that drives past the bridge on the Nooksack by the DOT station and that money should go directly back into road maintenance and public facilities.

My bet is there's a subtle difference between parking and camping. Park you RV and leave it while you (I don't give a rip; "something") overnight "somewhere else", no way they can charge you. Park your RV and make it obvious you're in it and "camping", pay the fee.

I plan on calling the ranger station to clarify. I understand that place wouldn't be plowed by the DOT if Baker weren't there, but Baker wouldn't be there either if public funds weren't doing the plowing.

With the growth of #vanlife seems like they might need to do something.

Crystal charges $30 Steven's $30 or $40. But that includes 30 amp electrical service.

Snoqualmie / Alpental charges $15

Charge double for Sprinter vans...

Charge double for Sprinter vans...

$1/ft of vehicle length?