National park officials have no plans to intervene in queueing dispute
Eleanor Storey, Press Association
A national park authority has no plans to intervene in a dispute over hikers queueing at the top of Wales’s highest mountain.
Videos on social media have sparked debate over people refusing to wait in line to reach the trig point at the top of Yr Wyddfa.
The queues are believed to have been exacerbated as recent hot weather has drawn visitors to the national park this summer.
A spokesman for the Eryri National Park Authority said its policy remained one of “self-policing” at the summit.
He said: “There are three quarters of a million people summitting annually, so queues are likely to be expected in peak times.”
He added there were no plans for new measures to be implemented this year but that the matter would be discussed at an end of visitor season meeting in the early autumn.
At 1,085 metres above sea level, the peak is a popular destination for hikers and the national park attracts nearly four million people a year.
The park has issued reminders this summer urging its visitors to leave trails clean and not to disturb wildlife.
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£10 summit tickets should sort it out.
£10 if they come up the train, £5 for those starting halfway up at Pen y Pass and £0 if you start close to sea level and come up the Watkin Path.
Another example of “the tragedy of the commons” – the more people who want to do a thing, the worse the experience of doing the thing becomes. I feel sorry for the people who are so chronically online that an achievement only matters if other people know you did it by you posting evidence of it on social media. What a way to live. They could deal with it by building a fake trig point just below the summit for people to take their photos with, but it’s such a ridiculous problem to have to deal with that I can… Read more »
I tend to think the National Park has long suffered from an excess focus on it’s highest peak. The fact that for decades it was marketed as Snowdonia and the mountain as Snowdon rather accentuated it as THE destination. I had hoped the move to Welsh naming might have encouraged a change but it hasn’t.
Just because it’s the highest in Wales doesn’t mean it would inevitably be the most popular. It’s not the case in England or Scotland.
Helvellyn is more popular than Scafell Pike, and Ben Lomond is more popular than Ben Nevis.
I prefer Carnedd Llewellyn myself.
Cnicht is a satisfying climb then wander round to the old slate quarry village Rhosydd and catch the cafe back down in Croesor, With the added benefit of great views of Y Wyddfa.
Of the 100’s of amazing ascents peaks, yr wyddfa is definitely one of the more unexciting ones.