Bryce Canyon National Park -- The History and Overcrowding of Sunset Point and the Fickle Geography of the Navajo Trail and "Wall Street"

       An undated historical picture of Bryce Canyon's early years, probably from the early 1920s.
                                                            -Photograph from Ruby's Inn collection.

  THE first recorded visit to Bryce Canyon was made in 1876, by a surveyor, G. Kirkpatrick. He visited what was later known as Sunset Point. (Gunnison Valley News, Oct. 31, 1935). So, from the onset it was Sunset Point as the centerpiece of the area ... and so it continues today, to the point of overcrowding.

  

        A Park Ranger blocks the entrance to Sunset Point, because the parking lot was full on October 5, 2026.

                        Closeup of the "lot full" sign on October 5, 2026.

 Why is Sunset Point access restricted at times?

  Sunset Point is still by far the most visited location in Bryce Canyon, though the U.S. Parks Service can’t handle the heavy crowds there, so at times the road entrance to the point is closed as “Lot Full.”

 The Parks Service desperately needs extra funding to enlarge the parking area at Sunset Point, because to not do so, you might as well close the entire entrance to Bryce, to ALL visitors, as this is the centerpiece, the crown jewel there.

  There is some shuttle bus service available, to Sunset Point, but given that most Bryce Visitors only stay a few hours, the bus service is not practical for the majority of tourists.

  (As it stands now, the road around the parking lot at Sunset Point doesn’t even accommodate a vehicle doing a loop there and so for a car to loop back around looking for an open parking space, requires a U-Turn some 600 feet westward at the main highway through Bryce. So, that limitation needs fixed, besides adding three or four times as many parking spaces in the area. In addition, the main highway through Bryce needs turning lanes into and out of Bryce Point.) There's no  safe space on the main park road in the area of Sunset Point turnoff either, to wait for a space to open up.

  Perhaps the Bryce Canyon Park Superintendent would be wise to invite a U.S. congress member from Utah to visit Bryce and see first-hand, the problems with overcrowding at Sunset Point. Then, this leader may be able to secure funds to make parking expansion possible there.

 

                            The switchbacks above Wall Street.

This picture, from the early 2010s shows how busy the south section of the Navajo Trail can be.

The first permanent/known residents in the Bryce Canyon area were Ruby and Clark Syrett. They built a ranch in the area of where Ruby’s Inn is today, in 1916. After seeing the Bryce amphitheater, they also began inviting friends from the nearby town of Panguitch to see the curiosity.

They also built a small lodge, known as “Tourist Rest,” closer to Sunset Point (elevation 7,920 feet above sea level). By 1919, the Syretts had tents set up each summer at Sunset Point for visitors.

  When Bryce was made a national monument in 1923, the Syretts returned to their ranch, 3.5 miles north of Sunset Point (and just outside the national monument boundary) and created what is today’s Ruby’s Inn. (Although a fire in 1984 destroyed the lodge and it had to be rebuilt/enlarged into what visitors see today.)

  In 1925, the Union Pacific Railroad built the Bryce Lodge. By 1928, Bryce was made a national park.

  (Note that Ebenezer Bryce is who Bryce Canyon is named after. He settled in the area in the 1870s and reportedly said the Bryce Canyon amphitheater was a hell of a place to lose a cow. The Bryce family soon moved southward, but the place name stuck. The Native American name for Bryce Canyon was the equivalent of this phrase: “Bowl-shaped canyon filled with reds rocks standing up like men,” according to the Milford News of June 20, 1935.)

What makes Sunset Point so special?

  First, it boasts what is the best commanding view from the rim at Bryce Canyon. Second, it offers the direct access to the Navajo Trail, the premier below-the-rim path at Bryce Canyon.

  The Navajo Trail’s first-ever public mention in a newspaper was in the Garfield County News, on June 30, 1928. (But a 1924 sketch map of Bryce is where the title Navajo Trail first appeared.)

  The trail appears to the be Bryce’s first inner canyon trail ever built. The National Forest Service constructed a rough section of the trail in 1917.
  The second trail made was the “Comanche Trail.” This path is today’s northern segment (the "Two Bridges" part) of the Navajo Trail, as the National Park Service discontinued the Comanche name in the 1930s and the entire loop became today’s Navajo Trail.

    Trail building in Bryce exploded in 1928-29, when the National Parks Service took over Bryce. That’s when the Queen’s Garden and Peekaboo trails were also constructed.

  The Rim Trail and the Fairyland Trail were made by the Civilian Conservation Corps (“CCC”) in 1934-1935. The CCC also built fences and parking areas.

  The road south to Rainbow Point was finished in 1934. (Note that the main road southward in Bryce climbs more than 1,000 feet in elevation as its dead end, at Rainbow Point is an elevation of 9,115 feet above sea level.)

  

Why is the Navajo Trail closed so much?

  The south section of the trail (“Wall Street” path) is not open in the winter and the path requires significant, on-going maintenance work, for erosion and safety control.

 (However, the northern section of the Navajo Trail loop is open year-round and it offers a more gradual drop into the canyon and features Thor’s Hammer and Two Bridges, as iconic formations along the way.)

    From this author’s own personal history, it was his visit on October 5, 2026, when Sunset Point access was first closed with a parking lot full status. In dozens of other visits, dating back to the 1960s, such a closure had never been experienced before.

  And, also on that same date in 2026, the Navajo Trail was closed again on the south side, the "Wall Street" segement. Dating back to 2015, this was the sixth consecutive time for the author that the Navajo Trail had been closed during his visits. While in dozens of previous visits to Bryce, between May and October, that trail had always been open.

 

                          National Parks workers coming up the Navajo Trail.

  Why is the southern section of the Navajo Trail closed so often now?

  The trail usage, when it the path is open, is way up and so the maintenance workload is greater now. And, it appears that when storms hit Bryce now, they are more intense and the flooding/erosion potential is greater, Plus, the National Parks Service seems to have a greater emphasis on safer trails.

  This Wall Street (southern section) of the Navajo Trail includes a lot of steep switchbacks, before it enters “Wall Street,” where narrow walls of colorful limestone rock and several towering Douglas-fir trees are passed. The trail drops 515 feet in elevation, to the bottom of the canyon – and it is just 1.3 miles in a loop, returning up via the northern section to Sunset Point.

This is a May 18, 1956 photograph of a tunnel/archway along the Navajo Trail's Wall Street upper section that no longer exists. This feature collapsed in the mid-1990s and the trail was rerouted. There is a similar archway in the same area (see the picture below), but that is a new version and one that is a window and not a through pathway. The photo above shows Harold and Venice Flygare of Ogden (left side, the author's Father-in-law and Mother-in law) with some friends on an outing at Bryce.

This is the replacement arch/tunnel for the original one, shown in the previous photograph.

  Bryce Canyon hiking may seem extra hard, because it sits at an elevation of almost 8,000 feet above sea level or greater.

  -Visitor Recommendations: If you visit Bryce Canyon and the Sunset Point Parking Lot is closed; travel south about a mile to the closest safe pullout and turn around and go back to the Lodge parking lot and walk the extra half-mile along the rim to Sunset Point. If the Wall Street section of the Navajo Trail is closed, you can usually still do the Two Bridges segment….

   
The Author is shown above the switchbacks and Wall Street in 2012, the last time he was able to hike "Wall Street," as it has been closed for his next 6 consecutive Bryce visits, with the most recent clsoure in October of 2026.

 

 Rainbow Point, the south end of the Bryce Canyon drive is more than 1,000 feet higher than the north end is, at Sunrise and Sunset Points.

        This sign highlights two other safety concerns when visiting Bryce Canyon National Park.

SOURCES:

-"The Modern Discovery, Popularization, and Early Development of Bryce Canyon, Utah," Utah Historical Quarterly, October 1981, by Nick Scrattish.

-National Park Service, on-line. https://www.nps.gov/brca/learn/historyculture/index.htm

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NICK SCRATTISH