Photos by Sam Dean | The Roanoke Times

Jim Offenbacker manages traffic Friday on the Blue Ridge Parkway. The route is primarily intended for motor vehicles, and traffic and speeds have picked up.

National Park Service workers clear brush from the Blue Ridge Parkway on Friday.

National Park Service workers clear brush from the Blue Ridge Parkway on Friday, maintenance that has been getting less funding. Some sections of the road are seeing less maintenance than usual.

A new management plan attempts to address a lack of funding that has left the parkway with a backlog of maintenance issues.

It might be time to say "good night" to camping on Roanoke Mountain.

The National Park Service says the site is the least used of nine campgrounds along the 469-mile Blue Ridge Parkway, and maybe it's time to find a new use for the facility.

That possibility -- as well as paved walking and biking trails beside the parkway in urban areas -- are just a couple in a long list of "preliminary alternatives" for a general management plan that will direct traffic and development along the parkway for the next two decades.

And if you want a chance to put in your 2 cents' worth on those proposals or any of the dozens of other changes being considered for the best-known scenic road in America, you have a little more time.

Last week, the park service announced it is extending the period for public comment until May 31.

Conceived in the midst of the Great Depression, construction of the parkway generated jobs while opening up the natural beauty and cultural history of the then-isolated Southern Appalachians.

It's not hard to find lingering resentments among some whose family farms were sliced by the parkway during its construction in Virginia and North Carolina between 1935 and 1987.

But the government project gave employment to thousands over a half-century, and today is the most-visited unit of the National Park Service, consistently drawing about 20 million people a year.

Despite its popularity, however, federal funding for the park for years has fallen well below needs for even basic maintenance.

So, some of the preliminary alternatives in the general management plan under consideration may be overly optimistic -- a reality noted in its introduction:

"Changes in conditions, technology, and new types of partnerships may make what seems unrealistic today appear to be relatively modest 15 years from now. Conversely, other ambitious undertakings may never be realized because of competing demands for limited federal funds."

The current study "will help us decide how far we should go," said Gary Johnson, the parkway's chief of planning.

"In that sense, we're testing the waters with different things we've heard. When we've seen what the public reaction is, we'll generate the costs and look at our capacity to accomplish that," he said last week from the parkway's headquarters in Asheville, N.C.

Because the parkway's construction was such a long-term project, planning during most of its history focused on completing the roadway. No general management plan has been formulated since the 1940s, according to the latest document.

That has meant that while many sections of the parkway retain their originally intended magnificent vistas and intricately landscaped boundaries, others have been allowed to become overgrown, with less and less maintenance.

Within its limited budget and even without an updated comprehensive management plan, Johnson said the parkway staff has tried to juggle the demands of keeping up with modern expectations and fulfilling their historic mission.

For instance, he said, "we've been working for the past several years, talking to campground visitors to see what they like and what they dislike. We've watched as the number of people camping continues to dwindle. A lot of private-sector campgrounds have more amenities, so we're looking at alternatives to make us more competitive. We want to provide the amenities today's public is looking for, as well as take care of those who look for a more rustic experience."

The proposed alternatives are divided into three streams:

n Version A focuses on a close adherence to the original plans and goals for the parkway, "to provide visitors the opportunity to experience an uninterrupted, relatively self-contained drive through this once remote mountain region, with parkway amenities that included recreation areas with lodges, gas stations, campgrounds, stores, restaurants, picnic grounds, trails, and scenic overlooks."

n Version B aims "to achieve a balance of traditional parkway experience with other modern-day management realities," according to the document. "For example, some ... areas could be managed for increased recreational use, resulting in the redesign or modification of parkway facilities or vegetation management practices that alter the intended designed landscape appearance."

n Version C "acknowledges that most visitors to the parkway are repeat visitors who do not travel the entire roadway but rather visit discrete places or sections of the parkway; therefore, this alternative explores options to expand recreational opportunities, enhance natural resource connectivity, as well as enhance the visitor's ability to connect to, explore, and learn about the region's natural and cultural heritage opportunities."

For example, alternative C includes a recommendation to "pursue the development of paved, multiuse trails parallel to, but separate from, the parkway in the four urban areas of the parkway -- Waynesboro, Roanoke, Boone/Blowing Rock, and Asheville -- to enhance opportunities for pedestrians and bicyclists to safely recreate within the parkway corridor where traffic levels are higher and opportunities to link to regional trail systems are available."

Bicycles would still be allowed on the road itself, although enthusiasts say riding there has become increasingly dangerous as traffic, and speeds, have picked up.

Johnson said a suggestion to widen the parkway for cyclists through the Roanoke area was deemed prohibitively expensive. And although cyclists are welcome, Johnson said, the route is still primarily intended for motor vehicles.

From his personal perspective, he said, "maintaining that scenic driving experience" of the original vision is a key to the continued success of the parkway as a national attraction. And related to that, he said, is keeping open the concessions -- lodges, restaurants, and service stations -- that were "so much a part of the original idea of the parkway."

Before anything happens, however, the park service will spend months compiling then studying the recommendations and comments of parkway users, local governments -- it passes through 29 counties -- and others interested in the roadway's future.

Roanoke County has not yet made any formal comments, according to Philip Thompson, deputy director of planning, but it intends to.

There will be a draft plan, then more public comment before a final document is formulated, which Johnson said he hopes is ready for implementation about the time of the parkway's 75th anniversary celebrations in 2010.

"It's important to look back at where we've come from," he said, "but we need to have the foresight to look where we're going, and to decide what we need to do today that is somewhat different from 50 years ago."