PHOENIX — The National Park Service just released a new study and interactive map that show that last year, tourists who went to national parks in Arizona brought in $1.2 billion.
Josh Coddington, who is in charge of communications for the Arizona Office of Tourism, said, “Our state’s national park sites are truly a national treasure, and we are lucky to have so many of them.”
There are 22 national parks in Arizona, which is why they are so good for the state’s business.
The Grand Canyon is the most important tourist attraction in our state. In 2023, people spent $738 million there.
“Tourism is what those smaller towns depend on the most,” Coddington said. “What people do in their towns, where they live, and the businesses that are there.”
There are also job breakdowns in the study. In Arizona, tourism in the parks supported 17,300 jobs, with more than half of those jobs going to people who came to see the Grand Canyon.
The overall amount of money that park visitors spend has pretty much gone back to where it was before the pandemic.
The number of visitors to Arizona’s public parks dropped from $1.3 billion in 2019 to $712 million in 2020, when the pandemic was at its worst.