Hawaii Plans Fee for Diamond Head

Stung by budget cuts of 30% over five years, Hawaii’s Division of State Parks plans to start charging people to visit the popular Diamond Head State Monument and to impose fees on campers.

The admission charge for Diamond Head, which draws more than 1 million visitors a year and whose 761-foot-high summit offers a panoramic view of Honolulu and the coast, is to begin Jan. 1, said Yara Lamadrid-Rose, park coordinator for the monument. At first, visitors will be charged a flat fee of $1 per person per day, payable in collection boxes at the site. In about a year, when a tollbooth is finished, daily fees will be $1 for walk-ins, $5 for cars and $10 to $40 for vans and buses (depending on capacity), she said.

Several tour firms have reportedly vowed to stop visiting Diamond Head when the fee starts. “We realize, once the tollbooth goes into effect, we’ll lose the big buses,” Lamadrid-Rose said.

The new camping fee of $5 per campsite (except in Kauai’s Na Pali Coast State Park, where it will be $10) is expected to begin about Feb. 1, when officials hope to have a reservation process in place, said assistant administrator Dan Quinn. Camping, allowed at about 15 of Hawaii’s 58 state-run parks, is now free.