Visitors to the National Mall
Lincoln Memorial
The National Park Service keeps pretty good records about the number of visitors to their parks and sites.
Below are the numbers that they have on the various monuments and memorials on the National Mall in
Washington D.C. and on the whole Mall in general.
Monument
Visitors in 2011
Visitors in 2012
Visitors in 2013
Thomas Jefferson
1,945,696
Monument was closed
on August 23, 2011
because of structural
damage due to a nearby
earthquake.
2,613,131
Franklin Roosevelt Memorial
2,309,708
2,764,459
2,837,729
Lincoln Memorial
Martin Luther King Memorial
- Opened on 8/22/2011
National Mall
5,971,220
6,191,361
6,546,518
1,490,358
3,738,336
3,205,654
About 24 million visitors
About 24 million visitors
About 24 million visitors
Washington Monument
430,153
Monument was
reopened on May 12,
2014 after damage was
repaired.
2,609,463
1. The Martin Luther King Memorial was opened on 8/22/2011. For what fraction of year 2011 was
the monument open to the public?
2. Considering that in 2011 the monument had 1,490,358 visitors and the monument was only open
for a fraction of the year, how many visitors at that same rate might you have expected to visit the
monument in the whole year, 2011?
Thomas Jefferson Memorial
George Washington Monument
3. The Washington monument was closed for part of year 2011 because on August 23, 2011 a 5.9magnitude earthquake in the area caused damage to the structure. The Washington Monument
was closed from about the time that the Martin Luther King Memorial opened. About what fraction
of the year was the Washington monument closed?
4. Had it not be damaged, roughly how many visitors to the Washington Monument might you have
expected in the year 2011?
5. Create at least 3 observations to share with your class pertaining to these visitor statistics and the
statistics that you calculated at these memorials and the National Mall in general during these past
3 years.
I also found monthly statistics for the National Parks visitors. I've listed the total number of monthly visitors
for only two of the National Mall's memorials during 2014 below.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt Memorial
2014
MLK
Memorial
FDR
Memorial
Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial
Jan
Feb
Mar
Apr
May
Jun
Jul
Aug
Sept
Oct
Nov
Decj
135,979
86,272
274,677
549,749
450,027
353,856
313,451
307,509
239,648
224,256
160,459
103,253
57,163
77,109
249,237
579,179
422,005
370,037
246,699
282,869
198,453
226,336
137,525
91,627
I was trying to compare how these memorials were visited monthly. I thought that they would be visited
the most during school vacations, according to a special date of the men honored, or maybe when the
Tidal Basin's cherry blossoms bloom (predicted to be this year around April 10th). Here's what I found:
! Franklin D. Roosevelt's birthdate was Jan 30, 1882 and his death was Apr 12, 1945.
! Martin Luther King's birthdate was Jan 15, 1929. This is also a National holiday in the U.S. His
death was on April 4, 1968.
Looking at the table seemed too difficult to me for making observations. So I created the chart below with
my data.
National Park Service's numbers of visitors per month 700,000 Number of visitors 600,000 500,000 400,000 MLK Memorial 300,000 FDR Memorial 200,000 100,000 0 Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sept Oct Nov Dec Month of 2014 6. What can you deduce? Try to find 3 observations about the monthly visitors to these two sites that
you can share with your class. List them here.
Source: https://irma.nps.gov/Stats/
http://www.nps.gov/mall/faqs.htm
https://irma.nps.gov/Stats/SSRSReports/National Reports/Current Year Monthly and Annual Summary Report %281979 Present%29
Brought to you by Yummymath.com