The NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service is seeking community feedback on proposed changes to camping in NSW national parks and reserves.
Proposed changes include:
- the introduction of consistent state-wide camping fees simplified bookings to deliver fairer camping experiences for national park visitors
- improved management of persistent campground issues such as people booking space and not cancelling or turning up.
Further community feedback will help the NSW Government to decide on next steps and whether proposed changes are adopted and implemented.
Please read the consultation paper outlining details of the proposal and share your feedback by 11.59pm on Sunday 25 May 2025.
I think that the key would to not have the bookings managed by an outside contractor, but monitored by an outside auditor.
I reckon that half of the Ghost Camping issue in Victoria is either ParksVic don’t want too many people at a campsite or the Bookings contractor gets paid a commission on bookings, so add fake bookings to boost KPIs.
The other half are arseholes who think that they would enjoy an empty campsite more than a campsite with other friendly people.
I think it’s more that it’s very easy (and now free) to book a campsite and there’s zero incentive for people to cancel bookings they aren’t going to use.
Ghost bookings would be a labour intensive way to limit the number of people at campsites (ParkVics would have far easier ways to do that) and Bookings contractor commissions? On free bookings? That wouldn’t be very lucrative.
Parks does often give the impression that they’d rather the plebs didn’t actually go into their parks, but I think them booking ghost camps might be a step too far given they could just reduce the nominal capacity further to get the same effect.
I would bet the vast majority of the problem is your second option of people booking out campgrounds to avoid others (with a side helping of those who aren’t sure which day they want to go out so they book all options). Looking at who has a record of cancelling bookings would probably allow one to cut out a lot of this as I suspect you’d find a bunch of repeat offenders.
The removal of fees and bookings for the unserviced and largely unmanaged tier of campgrounds is a welcome change, I did not like it when they introduced these.
Not getting 100% of the booking charge back sounds like it should cut down on people booking when they don’t actually mean to turn up, so I’d say that’s reasonable.
I have reservations about how expensive the higher tier charges are though, even the mid tiers are getting pricey for what’s supposed to be a cheap activity.
@Tau the higher tiers are a double-edged sword. Closer to cities where demand is higher, the campsites are more desirable and therefore the ghost booking issue is worse. A higher fee discourages that. On the downside, you pay more for convenience of not having to drive far.
I think they’ve struck a good balance overall. You can’t fix ghost bookings unless you have a financial disincentive.
Closer to cities where demand is higher, the campsites are more desirable and therefore the ghost booking issue is worse. A higher fee discourages that. On the downside, you pay more for convenience of not having to drive far.
The tier system described appears to be more based on available facilities though rather than visitor numbers, while it does mention demand in passing this isn’t quantified and the tier table shown works off facilities/servicing.
I would agree there does tend to be correlation between high demand campgrounds and highly serviced ones so you do have a point with high prices being necessary to some extent. I do think though that applying a state wide pricing system will end up with noticeably higher prices in a lot of places not near the major centres (or the major attractions).
@Tau fair comment, the correlation between facilities and demand is glossed over (by them, and me). I’m making the assumption that remote campgrounds cannot possibly be highly serviced.
I doubt it’s a perfect solution but IMO it’s an improvement. That makes it worthy of adopting. Monitor, and iterate.
NSW campsites by memory were double QLD prices in places. It felt incredibly expensive. I don’t recall fully, but man, in comparison to QLD it felt a bit of a rip.
They want to lift it even more now?
