Why Quebec's provincial parks saw a drop in visits last summer

It was a rough summer for Quebec's provincial parks network.

A combination of forest fires, bad weather and construction led to a big drop in visitor traffic, said Simon Boivin, a spokesperson for SEPAQ.

Between April 1and Sept. 30, SEPAQ saw an average decrease of 17.5 per cent across its 23 provincial parks compared with 2022.

Hot and dry conditions this past spring and summer triggered forest fires in several regions and forced SEPAQ to evacuate and temporarily close some destinations, such as Abitibi's Aiguebellepark.

Wildfires also raged on Quebec's North Shore and in the Saguenay region, which led the province's fire prevention agency to announce a ban on open fires in most regions for a good part of the summer.

"It's such a central part of the experience for campers that some were turned off by the fact that they couldn't do campfires and decided to postpone their stay," saidBoivin.

On the heels of the forest fires, there were heavy rains and flash flooding in some parts of Quebec last July, which caused a landslide in the Saguenay that killed two people and forced hundreds to leave their homes.

Montreal also endured one of the wettest summers on record which put a real damper on attendance at nearby parks.

The beaches at Okapark are usually a popular draw for many Montrealers, but it saw a 13 per cent drop in visitors compared with 2022.

The provincial park in Mont-Saint-Bruno saw a drop of 20 per cent and there was a 32 per cent decrease in attendance atles-de-Bouchervillepark.

"There might have been an impact as well coming from the roadwork in the tunnel Louis-Hippolyte-La Fontaine," said Boivin.

Due to major repairs, traffic flowing to the tunnel will continue to be disrupted by the permanent closure of three out of six lanes until at least November 2025.

It's too early to say what the drop in revenue means for the parks network. Some years are better than others, said Boivin, and SEPAQ hopes to make up for a poor summer this winter. But so far, the weather has been unseasonably mild and wet in certain parts of the province.

It's unlikely the parks will return to the record high attendance enjoyed during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic.

"You couldn't travel abroad, you couldn't go to any museum or restaurant or theatre," said Boivin. "Pretty much all you had to do was go to an outdoor destination to enjoy outdoor activities."

For the second year in a row, Quebec provincial parks will be free on designated days between December 18, 2022 and March 13, 2023.

The initiative was launched by the province's minister for sports, leisure and the outdoors, Isabelle Charest, and Tourism Minister Caroline Proulx to make Quebec parks more accessible and to encourage people to be active inthe winter.

Boivin said the program was asuccess in 2022.

"We witnessed 57,000 entries on those days that were free of fees and it's double what we observed on comparable dates the year before," he said.