The Director of the North Dakota State Park system says those going camping in 2016 may have to do a bit of advance planning.
Mark Zimmerman says under the current rules, about one-half of the state park camp sites can be reserved while the remaining sites are available on a first-come first-served basis. Zimmerman says with the parks seeing more and more traffic there has been some disappointment as some campers arrive to find out there are no sites remaining. He says in an effort to make things more equitable, 2016 will have ALL campsites at the parks will be “reservable…”
“…We’re trying to make it available to all people, whether they live five miles from the park, or they live on the other end of the state or they live out of state and they’re coming into North Dakota.”
Zimmerman says even though all sites will be “reserved camping”, there is still a first-come first-served element to the process…
“…On a Friday morning if that campsite isn’t reserved, by 9 o’clock in the morning, it becomes a ‘first-come first serve’. I don’t want to get too complicated here, but then it falls back to what it had been previously. On Friday morning if Site 29 hasn’t been reserved and Mark Zimmerman calls Fort Abraham Lincoln and says ‘Hey, Do you have any open sites?’ and they say ‘Yep, Number 29 is still available.’ You can reserve it right there, right then.”
Zimmerman says unlike reserve programs in other states, the North Dakota system will allow you to select the site when you make your reservation. He says persons with questions or comments about the system are encouraged to contact the state Park and Rec office in Bismarck.
