The Mauna Kea Visitor Information Station will be closed Sundays beginning Aug. 26 until further notice, according to the University of Hawaii.

The restrooms and parking lot will remain open, as will Mauna Kea Access Road and the summit area. Rangers will continue to be on duty.

The closure is to provide a day of recovery because the station has seen a significant increase in visitors since the May closure of Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park, according to UH.

The visitor station will be open from 9 a.m. to 10 p.m. Mondays through Saturdays. The situation will be reassessed in a month.

Volcanoes park sets date for a limited reopening

Hawai‘i Volcanoes National Park hopes to partially reopen by Sept. 22, which is National Public Lands Day, as long as the pause in earthquakes and eruption activity at Kilauea continues, park officials said.

Details of what will be open are still pending, but officials warned that visitors should expect limited hours and services.

“We have the difficult task ahead of us of identifying what we can safely open. Our first step will be bringing staff back into the park, while getting assessments done,” said parks Superintendent Cindy Orlando.

Orlando and other park staff are reaching out to the community in a series of “Talk Story” meetings to get feedback on the direction the park should take once it reopens. Park congestion and “pressing the reset button” to examine whether the park should return to serving more than 2 million visitors a year is one of the most passionate topics to arise.

The next Talk Story session is 10 a.m. Thursday in Kahuku, weather pending.

Most of the park, except the Kahuku Unit, has been closed due to increased volcanic and seismic activity since May 11.