Tourism

The Juneau Assembly approved a list of tourism industry policy objectives Tuesday night. They outline the city’s goals for negotiating with cruise ship companies and developing local tourism infrastructure.

The city hopes to curb issues like crowding and air pollution in the downtown area. Its objectives are to limit cruise ships to five per day in the downtown port, complete construction of the Seawalk, increase the city’s input in ship scheduling, electrify cruise ship docks and develop goals for emissions and congestion mitigation.

Some Juneau residents, like Steve Krall, told the Assembly that a five-ship limit wasn’t enough. 

“We’ve got too many people in too small an area,” he said. “Downtown hasn’t gotten any bigger, the sidewalks aren’t bigger, the roads aren’t bigger. We’re at the point where capacity really is the issue.”

Assembly member Maria Gladziszewski said they received several emails asking for a three or four-ship limit. She said the city would likely face legal opposition if it tried to enforce such a cap.

“We would be in litigation immediately,” she said. “It would take years and would cost a lot of money.”

Mayor Beth Weldon said negotiating with the tourism industry represents a new strategy for the city. Just a few years ago, it ended a contentious three-year lawsuit from the cruise industry over marine passenger fees.

“Some people will say it’s not a big enough step. I would say at least it’s a step,” she said. “We’re going to be the first Assembly that has actually tried to tackle some of these issues, so give us some time to ease into it.”

The Assembly appointed a Visitor Industry Task Force in October 2019. In March 2020, the task force presented 45 recommendations. Those recommendations inspired the five policy objectives approved Tuesday night.

Also on Tuesday, the Assembly voted against appropriating $300,000 for cruise ship dock planning at the downtown subport. Norwegian Cruise Line donated the land to the Huna Totem Corporation, which hopes to build a visitor center and cruise ship dock there by 2025.

The Haines Borough Assembly voted on Tuesday night to overturn a decision by the planning commission. The commission had issued a permit to Chilkat River Adventure for a heliport at its property 24 miles up the Haines Highway. The company intended to use the location as a staging area for its heliskiing tours.

The vote means there will be no helicopters landing there.

Five different appeals challenged the permit, mostly focusing on noise.

Jones P Hotch, Jr., Vice President of the Chilkat Indian Village, spoke of the need to protect traditional life in the valley and protect the animals that live there.

“We have been a tribal government recognized by western culture since 1934, but we have had tribal sovereignty since time immemorial,” he said. “We believe there are already more than enough helicopters in our valley. And we hope the Haines borough understands that the heliport is not compatible with surrounding land uses, including our traditional practices.”

Jessica Kayser-Forester, a consultant to the Chilkat Indian Village, cited studies of noise impact.

“The ambient noise level of this neighborhood was measured at 21 decibels. At the helipad itself the measurements exceeded 104 decibels,” she said. “Seventy is what the EPA and World Health Organization consider safe for human hearing. Forty-five decibels is loud enough to wake up a person within a one mile radius. One hundred four decibels will have a large impact on nearby residents. You cannot say that this is not undue noise. And will impact the village of Klukwan enough to wake residents during their sleep.”

Kayser-Forester cited further studies showing some animals are exponentially more sensitive to noise than humans.

And resident Riley Hall painted a picture of the acoustic properties of the area.

“The only things that mitigate helicopter noise are distance and acoustic barriers,” Hall said. “This specific location has none of those. It’s on flat ground with a mountain backdrop. And my joke about that mountain backdrop is it’s kind of a sound amplifier. If a duck farts in Klukwan I’m going to hear it at my property.”

Chilkat River Adventure owner Sean Gaffney took exception to the noise studies, claiming sound at the study area travels differently than at the River Adventure property.

Following a half hour of discussion about noise impacts, the assembly voted 5-1 that a heliport would create undue noise in the neighborhood. Assembly member Jerry Lapp cast the dissenting vote, citing existing industrial uses in the area.

“If you look at it on parcel viewer, this area is about half industrial,” he said. “You ‘ve got a rock crusher there, you’ve got a rock washer there, and you got another pit just down the road right here on the highway.”

Mayor Doug Olerud said the Planning Commission’s November decision emphasized the need to establish clear communication lines between the Chilkat Indian Village and the Haines Borough.

“To the people of the Chilkat Indian Village, I know during this I’d said certain things about having meetings,” he said. “And unfortunately as I looked through code, those meetings were not allowed for me to do. But as we moved forward with this, I would like to continue on working with you and find a way that we can have a government-to-government relationship that we can codify in some manner so as we go forward with things in the future, there is a mechanism for us to rely on.”

Permit applicant Sean Gaffney, whose company already has other helipads operating in the valley, did not respond to a request for comment.

The federal government has designated the Chilkoot Trail as a national historic trail. The designation, which was included in the federal omnibus spending bill, was announced Jan. 7 in a press release.

“It’s a great honor to be recognized as the Chilkoot National Historic Trail,” said Angela Wetz, superintendent of the Klondike Gold Rush National Historical Park. “To get people learning about the history of this area, of the park and the stories of the people that came here and the people that have been here for millennia.”

The Chilkoot Trail is the 20th in the nation to get the designation and, at 16 miles, the shortest. The designation could lead to some funding opportunities.

“There is some trail system funding that’s out there, not necessarily something we would get right away,” Wetz said. “But we would be able to compete for those funds in the Park Service.”

Right now the trail is closed due to flood damage from an October storm. Wetz says the designation will not affect the pace of repair.

“We are aiming towards an Aug. 1 opening, but we still have a lot of logistical  issues with supply chains and everything else to get us there,” she said.

To celebrate the designation, the park intends to hold a ceremony when the trail reopens.

The Mendenhall Glacier is one of Alaska’s most-visited tourist attractions in summer. But on a foggy, drizzly day in January, it was quiet except for the sound of Laurie Craig’s ice cleats.

She stood in the pavilion at the edge of the parking lot, pointing past an expanse of hemlock and spruce toward Nugget Falls. Craig saw hundreds of thousands of tourists pass through here when she was the lead naturalist at the visitor’s center. Now, she’s retired.

“That waterfall is awe-inspiring for people. They can go stand in the mist. And they’re thrilled. There’s goats you can see on the mountainside above, there’s bears walking along, tucked into the trees,” Craig said. “How do we preserve that magic? While we’re hosting a million people?”

The U.S. Forest Service is asking people to help them solve that dilemma between now and Feb. 21, during the third public comment period for the Mendenhall Improvement Project.

About 700,000 visitors passed through Mendenhall Glacier Recreation Area in 2017 — more people than the current visitor facilities were designed for. The Forest Service has been working on plans to upgrade the recreation area since 2019.

Ranger Tristan Fluharty says public feedback — more than 400 comments last time around — motivated the release of three new plans earlier this month.

“We’ve really tried to not just request those public comments, but also incorporate them into our alternatives,” he said.

There are also four existing plans, from earlier stages in the planning process. While the new alternatives work to address the public comments in some way, all seven plans remain on the table.

The new alternatives mainly address public concerns around the placement and design of new buildings, the presence of motorized boats on Mendenhall Lake and measures to protect local wildlife habitats.

The new plans offer three different visions for the new welcome center. Previous plans proposed a new welcome center in place of the pavilion on the edge of Mendenhall Lake. That drew concern over blocking the existing panoramic view. New alternatives preserve the view by moving the new welcome center — either by placing it on the hillside, near the existing visitor’s center, or by pulling it back from the lakeshore and making it two separate buildings.

Perhaps most significantly, alternative 6 is the only new plan that ditches motorized boats on Mendenhall Lake. During the last public comment period, the presence of boats raised concerns about visitor safety, emissions, disturbances to wildlife and more general fears about commercialization.

Alternative 6, which has the least environmental impact, also cuts carbon emissions by replacing motorized buses with electric shuttles.

But for all of these plans, Craig worries about the bears. She fears that trail expansion will break up habitats and increase potential encounters with people. Still, she says the new alternatives address many of her previous concerns, and she’s hopeful that people will keep sharing their opinions this time around.

“People get very tired of coming back and doing the same thing over and over. I’ve been there,” she said. “The important thing is when we commented the last time and said we want something different, the Forest Service listened, and is offering something new for us to consider,” she said.

There will be an open house at the Mendenhall Glacier Visitor Center on Jan. 24, 2023 from 4:00 until 7:30 pm, and a webinar Thursday Jan. 26, from 5:30 to 7:30, for the public to learn more.

Comments can be submitted online, by fax, by mail or by hand until Feb. 21.

White Pass and Yukon Route Railroad will resume service this summer to Fraser, British Columbia, and Carcross, Yukon after three years of pandemic-related shutdowns. The railroad is Skagway’s largest employer, with about 170 workers.

White Pass Executive Tyler Rose says they have a lot of infrastructure work to finish before the season starts, but that should be completed in time.

“You know, we’re very pleased. I mean, obviously, coming off 2022 and 2021, and before that, things look very positive right now,” Rose said.

The official schedule shows one-way passenger service to Fraser will run daily from early May through early October with continuing or return service being fulfilled by bus companies. Service to Carcross and Bennet will begin at the end of May and wrap up in mid-September.

Carcross-based business owner Bonnie O’Connor, who runs the Matthew Watson General Store with her husband, says they are excited to see the increase in visitor traffic.

“I think we all enjoy seeing that train rumble into town every day. You know, when you hear the whistle up the lake, you will see people rush out to the street, buy popcorn, sit on the bench, and watch it come in. It’s a nice moment that we all share. So yes, from a business standpoint, it’s, it’s really great to be for us and great for all of the businesses in Carcross,” O’Connor said.

She says her business met its goals for last year, but it was still only a third of what they saw in 2019. She says finding employees this summer is going to be extra difficult.

“Staffing is one of the biggest hurdles for all of us. Yeah, every business in town, and you know, that, it, it just gets wrapped up in a whole load of lack of available housing. The price of gas, you know, for people who might have considered commuting from Whitehorse to work in Carcross it’s — it’s unthinkable the way things are now,” O’Connor said.

Skagway Mayor Andrew Cremata says White Pass returning to Canada will also be good for his community.

“Being able to take thousands of people over the border into Canada on the train is going to alleviate a lot of the congestion here in town. I also think it’s wonderful for people living in Carcross. And for people living in the Yukon. It’s going to be a big boost to their economy,” said Cremata.

He says he expects a return to pre-pandemic cruise ship visitor numbers, or possibly more this summer.

The railroad will offer a combination train and bus service to Whitehorse, Yukon Territory from the end of May through the middle of September. They also plan to offer daily round-trip summit tours all summer. It is still unclear when they will offer Chilkoot Trail return trips as the trail remains closed due to extensive flooding last fall.

Alaska’s job market will continue on a path of recovery this year, though it’s still a long way from where it was before the pandemic.

That’s according to the 2023 job forecast from the state’s Department of Labor. Karinne Wiebold is an economist with the state and authored the report in the department’s monthly magazine.

“Pretty much every industry is forecasted to grow next year,” she said. “But a lot of them are just returning to pre-pandemic levels. So this is just kind of a return to normalcy.”

The state’s job market took a huge blow in 2020 when the pandemic hit. Wiebold said that was less true for the Kenai Peninsula than other regions of the state, in part because the peninsula didn’t see such big losses from canceled cruise ships.

“In fact, the Kenai Fjords National Park had one of its best years ever in 2021,” she said. “And that was propelled by local visitors as well as some independent, non-cruise-based travelers.”

That’s a big contrast from Denali National Park, for example, which gets a majority of its visitors from cruise ships.

Since those early pandemic days, the state has been gaining jobs across all regions — slowly.

Some factors are limiting growth nationwide, like low labor force participation.

But on the whole, Alaska’s recovery is slower than in other states. Wiebold said national challenges are compounded by factors like Alaska’s reliance on tourism and oil.

“Oil’s really taken a wild ride,” she said. “And exactly why our oil jobs have been slower to recover than some of the other Lower 48 is a little bit hard to tell. But it might have to do with our more remote location, and it’s just a little bit harder to get things going again.”

Another limiting factor, she said, is that Alaska came into the pandemic in a weak position, following a three-year recession. The state was just starting to add jobs back from that recession when COVID-19 hit in early 2020.

At least one piece of legislation is expected to bring jobs this year: The federal infrastructure bill, passed by Congress in 2021. On the Kenai Peninsula, that money is expected to boost airports and harbors, among other fish passage and bluff stabilization projects.

“But what’s really difficult at this point is really tracking down where that money’s going and when it’s going to hit the road,” Wiebold said.

Construction is one industry that’s forecasted to be above its pre-pandemic levels this year, as is transportation and warehousing.

“That’s pretty much it,” she said. “Those two are going to grow above pre-pandemic levels. Everybody else is still playing catch-up. Oil and gas is a really good example of that.”

Even with forecasted growth this year, Wielbold said employment levels in that industry will still be down 25 percent from where they were before the pandemic — a difference of more than 2,000 jobs.

“So there’s plenty of industries that have a long way to grow,” Wiebold said.

And she said Alaska’s job market is still a workers’ market, since there are so many job openings. She said that provides a lot of opportunity for workers to decide how and where they want to be employed.