State parks attendance up 17 percent over holiday weekend

PHOTOGRAPHER: The Associated Press

State parks officials say Memorial Day weekend attendance at New York’s 178 parks was up 17 percent over last year’s holiday weekend, despite 41 parks opening only at the last minute because of the budget crisis.

Parks officials say that attendance from Saturday through Monday topped 1.7 million, an increase of more than 245,000 visitors over May 23-25, 2009.

Gov. David Paterson targeted 41 parks and 14 state historic sites for closing and sought service cuts at others to save the state money. All were open for the holiday weekend after Paterson and the Legislation restored $11 million to the parks system’s budget last Friday.

The attendance numbers were released today.