Magazine

FM College ~ News & Articles

Deferred Maintenance in Nations Parks Gets Worse

Oct 22, 2023 | Public | 0 comments

Yosemite national park

Service is focused on a major challenge in Congress as it struggles with a maintenance backlog of more than $22 billion.   October 23, 2023

The deferred maintenance crisis plaguing many institutional and commercial facilities actually presents managers with two huge challenges. The first challenge, obviously, is to secure funding to address the maintenance backlog that grows each year. The second challenge tests managers’ views of the future of their facilities: Are funds best spent on addressing critical short-term tasks that affect daily operations or on longer-term projects that will ensure longer-term facility performance?

For many organizations, this debate takes place behind closed doors. But in the case of the U.S. National Park Service, it is taking place in public.

The National Park Service is focused on a major challenge in Congress as it struggles to catch up with a maintenance backlog of more than $22 billion, according to Roll Call. Three years ago, Congress enacted a law to provide up to $1.3 billion annually for five years to rebuild trails, roads, bridges, shelters, visitor centers and other facilities. The backlog then was around $14 billion.

But the new management in the Biden administration decided the funds would be better spent on long-term solutions rather than short-term Band-Aid projects, and the needs are now estimated to be $22.3 billion.

By Dan Hounsell, Senior Editor

Dan Hounsell is senior editor for the facilities market. He has more than 30 years of experience writing about facilities maintenance, engineering and management. 

The post "Deferred Maintenance in Nations Parks Gets Worse" appeared first on FN Prime Maintenance & Operations

0 Comments

Submit a Comment

Capacity for renewable power generation grows

Canada-wide capacity for renewable power generation from wind, solar or energy storage inputs has grown by nearly 7,600...

Top 4 School Security Tech Trends of 2025

In a recent school pilot, a robot patrolled Santa Fe High School around the clock to survey the sprawling campus for...

Ground Broken on Wichita Biomedical Campus Project

The $172.5-million, eight-story, 350,000-square-foot building is expected to open in 2027. The Wichita Biomedical Campus...

Design Resiliency Often Means Going Beyond Building Code Requirements

With extreme weather events on the rise, constructing more resilient facilities requires taking extra steps. As the deadly...

Green light for Brookfield Properties’ redevelopment plans of 99 Bishopsgate

Brookfield Properties has secured approval from the City of London’s Planning Committee for a new 54-storey office tower at...