California’s San Gabriel Mountains Makes Fodor’s 2024 ‘No Go’ List Due to Trash, Graffiti

President Barack Obama announced nearly 347,000 acres within the San Gabriel Mountains northeast of Los Angeles a national monument at the Frank G. Bonelli Regional Park in San Dimas, Calif. on Oct. 10, 2014. Evan Vucci/AP Photo

The San Gabriel Mountains National Monument in Southern California, located about 60 miles northeast from Los Angeles, was placed on Fodor’s “no go” list earlier this month, due to it being covered in trash and tagged with graffiti.

The site was designated to the National Forest Service by President Barack Obama in 2014 and is operated by the U.S. Forest Service. Land from the Angeles National Forest and the San Bernardino National Forest make up the nearly 350,000-acre monument.

“The number of visitors combined with lack of oversight and environmental awareness has led to the deterioration of what should be a natural oasis for Los Angeles County,” the Fodor’s publisher said in an article Nov. 7.

The U.S. Forest Service hasn’t received additional funding to operate the new monument, leaving volunteers to maintain it. Three times a month, they do so to pick up trash and scrub graffiti and other vandalism, according to Fodor’s.

A recent clean-up effort netted more than 800 pounds of trash, according to Fodor’s.

The number of visitors to the monument has impacted the park and habitat, but solutions to cleaning it up can be found, according to the San Gabriel and Lower Los Angeles Rivers and Mountains Conservancy, an environmental preservation organization created by the Legislature in 1999.

“I think if we all work together, we can come up with those solutions,” Mark Stanley, executive director of the conservancy, told The Epoch Times. “We’re certainly invested in helping to manage that area.”

To maintain the park and its natural habitat, more funding is needed, as well as a better understanding of its environment, Mr. Stanley told the travel guide.

The area—which includes the neighboring national forests—gets about 4 million visits each year, and offers hiking, cross-country skiing, hunting, nature viewing, water activities, horseback riding, and camping, according to the U.S. Forest Service.

To create the yearly list, the international tourist guide focuses on three main areas of tourist impact: overtourism, trash production, and water quality and sufficiency.

“We hope this list will encourage readers to find new ways to interact with some of the world’s most iconic attractions, rather than avoid them altogether,” Fodor’s wrote.

Lake Tahoe made Fodor’s 2023 “no go” list. The lake is famous for its clear, deep waters, but received too much traffic after the COVID-19 pandemic, the travel guide said.

The U.S. Forest Service did not respond to a request for comment on deadline.