Banff has traded wilderness for spectacle, selling its soul to tourism and capitalism—and in the process, abandoned its mission as a national park.
As an Albertan, my advice to out-of-province visitors is simple: if you’re heading West to see the Rockies, do yourself a favour and skip Banff. Unless you’re wanting to see what not to do with a National Park, in which case, Banff is the perfect cautionary tale.
Founded as the first national park in Canada, it’s safe to say Banff is no longer a national park; it’s a glorified outdoor amusement park with some mountains in the background. The parks meaning has been swallowed whole by overcrowding and commercialization. Instead of breathing in the fresh air, one instead breathes in exhaust fumes from idling cars waiting for their turn for an Instagram-famous viewpoint.
This summer, Mark Carney waived fees to boost “accessibility” amid tariff wars and Jasper’s rebuild, but Banff couldn’t handle the surge in visitors. Parks Canada acknowledged a problem of overcrowding in Banff in 2024, rolling out a Visitor Use Management Plan for the Lake Louise Area—“a long-term approach to managing visitor use in the Lake Louise area in a way that protects nature and history,” according to Parks Canada. As of Aug. 18, Banff had a total of approximately 729 thousand visitors—a whopping 300 thousand more than the second place contender of Jasper National Park.
Banff isn’t about nature anymore—it’s a selfie stage. Visitors flock to Lake Louise and Moraine Lake, elbow their way to the shore, snap a 10-second photo, and flee like they’ve checked off a to-do list. Forget the hiking boots at home—you’re more likely to see stiletto heels and ring lights, making trips to Banff less about connecting with the land and more about proving to followers that you once stood near some turquoise water.
What makes it worse is Banff’s obsession with consumerism—a fire Park’s Canada only adds fuel to. One might think a national park would emphasize conservation, history, and education—commitments stated in the Parks Canada Madate and Charter. Instead, Banff’s main strip is slowly transitioning into a high-end shopping district.
Why does a national park have designer stores in a protected wilderness? Nothing says, “escape to nature” like dropping $800 at Canada Goose before buying a Starbucks latte to fuel your five-minute “hike.” It’s capitalism at its most absurd.
Meanwhile, the trails—the part of the park that should matter—are crumbling. Since 2014, Banff residents have complained that horse traffic is wrecking paths and littering them with manure. In a protected landscape meant to preserve nature, turning trails into open sewers isn’t exactly conservation, just another money grab.
Lake Louise’s shiny new parking system is equally embarrassing. On top of the $11 daily park fee ($75 yearly), visitors now face $36.75-a-day parking and a shuttle. Instead of gouging tourists twice, a simple reservation system would guarantee spots without the cash grab.
Paying for Banff is like buying a VIP ticket to Disneyland—except instead of rides, you get overcrowded trails, crumbling infrastructure, and a luxury mall dressed up as wilderness.
Congratulations, Parks Canada! You’ve managed to alienate the only people who actually value the park.
To give credit where credit is due, once you’ve actually managed to get a spot in the park, Banff is physically accessible even if it’s not financially. It offers plenty of ways to experience nature for those with physical barriers, such as taking the Sulphur Mountain Gondola instead of hiking the mountain—yet one gets slapped in the face with a $74 price tag to take the lift.
If financial barriers aren’t enough, Banff’s problems run deeper—starting with the government’s baffling decision to allow three ski resorts inside one national park.
Banff was never meant to be Whistler-lite, yet Sunshine, Lake Louise, and Norquay ski hills carve up its mountains, littering the wilderness and replacing reverence for nature with après-ski culture. If national parks exist to preserve land for future generations, then ski hills are the ultimate contradiction—environmental destruction packaged as recreation. If you want to ski, go literally anywhere else that isn’t supposed to be a protected ecosystem.
Here’s the good news: Alberta has a magnitude of better options. Peter Lougheed Provincial Park offers raw wilderness and trails that actually feel like nature, not a conveyor belt of tourists. Kananaskis Country is just as breathtaking, with fewer crowds and no luxury storefronts in sight. Or if you’re up for adventure, Alberta’s crown land is wide open for camping and backpacking. These places are what Banff failed to be: spaces where the Rockies are more than a backdrop for a TikTok.
Banff is, at this point, a parody of itself. It’s Disneyland with mountains, a place where nature is secondary to branding. Overpriced, overcrowded, and overhyped, Banff has become the least authentic way to experience the Rockies. If you want to shop, go to a mall. If you want nature, go literally anywhere else.
Sarah is a 4th year Political Studies and Philosophy student and The Journal’s Editor in Chief.
Tags
Alberta, Banff, hiking, nature
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Tim
Stop the American monopoly that a certain tour company owns in our park. Your elbows up at the checkouts ,time for elbows up on your vacation. Canadian owned are Norquay,Sunshine and lake Louise all with stunning views and no crowds.
James Pyecroft
Sarah Adams is right to call Banff the “Disneyland of the Rockies.” Those of us who live in the Bow Valley see it every day: nature and community sacrificed for tourism spectacle. What her editorial didn’t capture, though, is how this extraction economy lands on the people who actually built our homes and lives here.
For residents who bought decades ago, raised families, or retired here, the message we hear now is that we’re the problem. I still remember a Town survey years ago asking how many people lived in each home. It felt like a prelude to targeting households like mine — empty-nesters or seniors living alone — as if we were “under-utilizing” the very space we worked our lives to earn. That’s not respect. It’s erasure.
Tourism is not sustainability. At best, it’s transience dressed up as strategy. The entire model depends on seasonal workers from across Canada and abroad — young people on visas or gap years who cycle in and out, leaving little behind except service gaps and pressure on housing. When I can’t even keep the same barber for more than a few months because they’re gone by the next season, it tells you everything you need to know about stability in a tourism-first economy.
Another overlooked piece is the rise of seasonal gig operators. Vans and trailers roll into Canmore each summer, hauling e-bikes or shuttling tourists to Lake Louise. They operate out of rental homes, scrub down their vans in neighborhood driveways, and vanish when the season ends. These aren’t permanent businesses investing in Canmore; they’re transients cashing in, pulling money out of town rather than building it up.
What would have been sustainable was using Canmore’s gem — its beauty, location, and livability — to attract permanent, high-skilled Canadian professionals: doctors, engineers, scientists, finance, entrepreneurs. If the Town had invested in offices and created incentives, those families would be buying the homes now snapped up by speculators. Their presence would have raised wages across the board, leaving room for the smaller number of staff housing units truly needed.
Instead, land was mismanaged and short-term revenue was prioritized. The Town doubled down on tourism with hotels, coffee shops, short term rentals, and now punitive taxes targeting second-homeowners — many of whom bought with the intention of retiring here. It feels like the gem we nurtured has been wrestled out of our hands, not because residents failed, but because leadership lacked vision.
Banff is already a national cautionary tale. If Canmore stays on this path, it won’t be far behind. Calling that “sustainability” is not just misleading — for those of us who live here, it’s a gut punch.
Sara from Calgary
Yes, but…
By writing this, do you hope to encourage more tourists to overcrowd the more pristine areas in the mountains? Banff may be overcrowded and hyped, the free passes only give the impression the experience can be taken for granted, and I have a personal frustration with the explosion in hotel prices and other locals-unfriendly policies… But: Banff remains a relatively accessible place for average people to enjoy truly spectacular scenery and a natural (if not wholly pristine) environment. Rather than decrying the popularity, it could be celebrated that people want to see the majesty, and celebrate that these people are concentrated in certain built areas, rather than spreading throughout the region disrupting foliage and beasts. Who’s to say that one person’s preferred usage is is more valuable than another (be it film or ring cameras, even hiking or ATVs, etc)? If a person gets into deeper backcountry interests, they will learn where else to go – and please be mindful when you do as we don’t need more bears destroyed and trails braided. These are tremendously important issues that the region has been grappling with for many years – solutions can only be found that respect their complexity.