Xanterra Travel Collection (formerly Xanterra Parks & Resorts, Amfac Resorts and Amfac Parks & Resorts) is a privately owned
American park and resort management company based in
Greenwood Village, Colorado
The City of Greenwood Village is a home rule municipality located in Arapahoe County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 15,691 at the 2020 United States Census. Greenwood Village is a part of the Denver–Aurora–Lakewood, CO Met ...
, controlled by entertainment magnate
Philip Anschutz. Denver-based billionaire Anschutz, who has an extensive history of developing and operating mineral, railroad, newsmedia and entertainment enterprises, is one of the largest private promoters of live events in the world, most notably soccer.
Xanterra currently partners with the
National Park Service
The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propert ...
to provide lodging and other tourism services inside
National Parks
A national park is a natural park in use for conservation purposes, created and protected by national governments. Often it is a reserve of natural, semi-natural, or developed land that a sovereign state declares or owns. Although individua ...
.
History
A legacy of the 19th century
Fred Harvey Company
The Fred Harvey Company was the owner of the Harvey House chain of restaurants, hotels and other hospitality industry businesses alongside railroads in the Western United States. It was founded in 1876 by Fred Harvey to cater to the growing ...
, after the death of the founder's grandson in 1965, the company became affiliated with Chicago-based
JMB Realty
JMB Realty was a real estate investment company based in Chicago. In 1993, after suffering during the early 1990s recession, the company spun off its retail properties as Urban Shopping Centers, Inc., which was acquired by Rodamco in 2000 and bro ...
, which acquired large Hawaii landholder
Amfac in 1968 and broke it up into independent corporations including Amfac Resorts. In 1995, Amfac bought the large national parks management concession
TW Recreational Services from
Flagstar. In 2002, Amfac changed its corporate name to Xanterra after the bankruptcy of Amfac Hawaii. The name comes from a combination of
Xanadu and terra (
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...
). The Anschutz Company bought Xanterra from JMB in 2008.
Xanterra specializes in tourism in U.S.
National Parks, and has a presence in
Yellowstone
Yellowstone National Park is an American national park located in the western United States, largely in the northwest corner of Wyoming and extending into Montana and Idaho. It was established by the 42nd U.S. Congress with the Yellowston ...
and
Grand Canyon, and a number of other national and state parks. They are contracted by the
US National Park Service
The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propertie ...
to provide lodging and services in these parks. Accommodations and pricing vary widely and include quality hotel rooms, lodges, rustic cabins, motel-style lodging and camping.
![Xanterra Parks & Resorts](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Xanterra_Parks_%26_Resorts.jpg)
The most notable of the original Harvey operations is the Grand Canyon South Rim concession, including the
El Tovar Hotel
The El Tovar Hotel, also known simply as El Tovar, is a former Harvey House hotel situated directly on the south rim of the Grand Canyon in Arizona, United States.
The hotel was designed by Charles Whittlesey, Chief Architect for the Atchison ...
.
Glacier National Park controversy
In March 2013, Anshutz Exploration Corp. announced that it would cease drilling on the Blackfeet Reservation. Five months later, Xanterra was awarded an important concessions contract in Glacier National Park.
On August 13, 2013, the National Park Service announced that a 16-year contract would be issued to Xanterra despite the fact that the energy division had been fracking on lands adjacent to the eastern boundary of the park. Members of the Blackfeet Nation had been protesting the destruction of tribal lands for several years.
Grand Canyon Railway
Xanterra operates the
Grand Canyon Railway
The Grand Canyon Railway is a heritage railroad which carries passengers between Williams, Arizona, and the South Rim of Grand Canyon National Park.
The railroad, built by the Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway, was completed on September 1 ...
in Arizona on the line originally built by the
Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway
The Atchison, Topeka and Santa Fe Railway , often referred to as the Santa Fe or AT&SF, was one of the larger railroads in the United States. The railroad was chartered in February 1859 to serve the cities of Atchison, Kansas, Atchison and Top ...
. Since their takeover of the operation in 2007, the line has removed its historic
steam locomotives
A steam locomotive is a locomotive that provides the force to move itself and other vehicles by means of the expansion of steam. It is fuelled by burning combustible material (usually coal, oil or, rarely, wood) to heat water in the locomot ...
and
ALCO
The American Locomotive Company (often shortened to ALCO, ALCo or Alco) was an American manufacturer of locomotives, diesel generators, steel, and tanks that operated from 1901 to 1969. The company was formed by the merger of seven smaller locomo ...
FA diesels from service in favor of their modern
EMD F40FH diesels. Although, two of the FAs, #6793 and #6860, are still operational to pull the Williams Flyer train, and steam locomotives
#29 and
#4960, modified to run on
waste vegetable oil
Vegetable oil can be used as an alternative fuel in diesel engines and in heating oil burners. When vegetable oil is used directly as a fuel, in either modified or unmodified equipment, it is referred to as straight vegetable oil (SVO) or pure pl ...
, are also still used on special occasions.
References
External links
Xanterra website
{{Authority control
Anschutz Corporation
Travel and holiday companies of the United States
Transport companies established in 1994
Companies based in Greenwood Village, Colorado
1994 establishments in Colorado
2008 mergers and acquisitions