EISPIRATEN

SGWA has a Google Calendar app these days that shows availability of permits:
http://sgwa.org/wilderness-permits/permit-availability/
Over Labor Day weekend, this new notice showed up there:

Effective 9/1/17 Day Hikes will not be limited to a quota. All Day Hikes have become available for each date in the calendar. If you were previously denied for a Day Hike, You can resubmit your request to get approval. Self Issue forms will also be available for all open trails.

This seems like a big change, and although the wording is a little open to interpretation, it looks like this is intended to be permanent. It would be interesting to hear why they decided to change this. My perception was that the system had been very chaotic and error-prone, and the rules were illogical. (The daily quota was a number of groups, not a number of people, so it was just as hard to get a permit for a solo hiker as for a group of 12).

Personally I've been doing Vivian Creek as a run on Fridays, and I'm really looking forward to not having these hassles anymore.

But I guess we'll see whether the change results in problematic environmental impacts, the trails looking like conga lines on Saturdays, parking lots filling up, or outhouses overflowing.

It won't completely eliminate the hassles, because you still need a permit.

I'm curious how many self-issue permits will be left out for people too. Having to fax in and wait for reply is not a good modern system although that means we can still talk about how things were in the old days.

JeffH wrote: Having to fax in and wait for reply is not a good modern system although that means we can still talk about how things were in the old days.

I use faxzero.com, which at least eliminates the need to use a physical fax machine. You can also send in an application by paper mail.

Maybe the snail mail/fax system got overwhelmed. It takes time to manually review each request for availability.