National parks put up 'selfie stands' to help manage crowds wanting to get that perfect photograph of their visit

Selfie stand in Iowa's Black Hawk County

Parks are so overrun this summer that crowd control has become a major issue for the National Park Service. Some parks "are using counterintuitive tricks like encouraging selfies in one place to prevent them in another, and they are rolling out algorithms and autonomous vehicles to manage the throngs of recreation-seekers," Katharine Gammon of The Guardian reports. Park officials "are also acknowledging a hard truth: perhaps there simply isn’t enough space at America’s most iconic attractions for everyone who wants to visit them."

One major challenge is "the many visitors all aiming to get the perfect photograph, Gammon reports. "At popular spots in Yosemite and near the Grand Canyon, some have even fallen to their deaths in the process. . . . Enter the selfie station: a humble wooden stand in front of a stunning vista, ready to hold a camera for a safe and easy photo experience. They are part of an effort to corral people’s natural desire to take photos and to promote less-well-known areas."

State parks are doing likewise. "Tom Hazelton, who leads Iowa’s County Conservation System, has overseen the installation of more than a hundred selfie stations in his state" in the last three years, Gammon reports. “They are getting used and they are low maintenance and easy to build; the signs are $30 and the wood is another $60, and there you go.”