Buntzen Lake Parking Reservations Suck
Published at 08:29 on 10 July 2026
They suck because a) they are free, and b) there is no easy way to cancel. So what happens is that people who think they might want to go make reservations well in advance, just in case, and then often become no-shows as their plans change. Why shouldn’t they? There’s no real downside… for them, that is.
The downside comes for the rest of us who like to embrace the moment. Yesterday, there were no all-day parking reservations available, despite the parking lot looking like this:
And that exercise in bureaucratic stupidity settles it: from now on, I forget about Buntzen Lake and continue past practice of just going to nearby Sasamat Lake (which has more sensible policies, and has a shuttle bus from the nearest SkyTrain station) instead.
A more reasonable situation would be paid but fully refundable reservations. Charge, say, $10 to make a reservation, then refund the $10 if you either explicitly cancel or if you show up. No-shows lose $10. The park remains free, overcrowding remains controlled, and those who make reservations have an incentive to cancel them and open up their slots to people who show up same-day.