Banff National Park continues to welcome visitors as Jasper remains closed until further notice due to the wildfire that devastated the area.
However some visitors have had concerns and confusion on whether they should be visiting.
Jonah Johnson and a few of his friends came up to Banff from Kansas City, Missouri. They had been planning a trip to the Rockies since January and nearly cancelled upon hearing about the wildfire in Jasper National Park. The group did consider cancelling their trip.
“It was like 12 hours before we had to have a serious conversation about it and do our own research to make sure,” said Johnson. “Hearing about the tragedy that’s going on up there made us have to keep a really close eye on Banff and surrounding areas that we plan to visit.”
The group did not have concrete plans to visit Jasper but was considering it. Had they cancelled the trip they would have lost thousands of dollars.
“I was pretty much sweating doing my research on Reddit and all other sorts of media to figure out if it was still worth coming up here, if it was going to be safe, or if we were going to, you know, affect people negatively by being up here at this time,” said Johnson.
Open to visitors
Banff and Lake Louise Tourism (BLLT) wants to make it clear the area is open to visitors and that there is no wildfire concern to the area.
“We are open for business,” said Banff and Lake Louise Tourism president and CEO Leslie Bruce. “We’ve got blue skies, we’ve got lots to do, and we’re really excited and hopeful that people will see their plans through and come and visit this weekend.”
According to Bruce, the upcoming long weekend is one of the busiest of the year. Since the wildfire broke out in Jasper National Park, destroying 30 per cent of the town, inquires have been coming in on if people can still visit Banff.
“We’re hearing from businesses, and we’re hearing ourselves (Banff and Lake Louise Tourism) that people want to understand if it’s safe to come and if we’re open for business. We’ve received a lot of calls, a lot of emails and its clear there’s still some confusion”
“We really want to clear the air and help people understand that we are open for business this weekend.”
Waterton Lakes National Park also open
In September of 2017, a wildfire tore through nearly 19,000 hectares in Waterton Lakes National Park.
“When we first heard about (the Jasper wildfire) it was PTSD for us, we were all here in in 2017, we went through hell,” said Waterton Park Chamber of Commerce president Shameer Suleman. “It really struck a chord. It struck close to home. For us, it wasn’t mid-July, which I can’t even imagine.”
Wateron is now feeling a two-fold impact from the wildfire in Jasper National Park. According to Suleman, some bus tours which visit Banff, Canmore, Waterton, Glacier National Park, and Jasper have cancelled.
Waterton Lakes National Park, Sept. 16, 2022
“A third of their tour is now done if they can’t go up to Jasper. So we did have a lot of cancellations,” he said.
At the same time the area has been welcoming visitors who are already in Alberta, who are now looking for a destination to visit since they are unable to spend time in in Jasper.
“There were so many tourists from all over the world who were already in Alberta that had planned to be in Jasper and rerouted and ended up coming down to Waterton,” said Suleman. “We did get some exposure that normally we wouldn’t get.”
August long weekend is typically the area’s busiest of the summer, according to Suleman, who expects hotels and campground to be at capacity.