Ed Dunlavey called me as well this morning, just got off the phone with him. I was focused on hiking SE out of Yosemite on either Fernandez Pass, Isberg Pass, or Post Peak Pass (the 3 different trail paths on established trails to leave Yosemite in that direction), all headed towards Clover Meadow, if there is foreseen (by him) any impact in 2015 about those options being changed. He answered that he does not foresee a change there for any interim changes (or for 2015). Regarding the option of Mono Pass, the park is concerned that abuse is not done there such as they've seen people seek permits to hike North from Tuolumne to Glen Aulin and then they turn around on day two and hike south onto the JMT. They would not want people to hike over Mono Pass, turn around or go cross-country and end up going over Donahue. The park wants people (rightly) to abide by the permit they get. If such honest practices are the overwhelming norm then there should be no change to the Mono Pass route in 2015 over what it was in 2014. He did mention one has to hike south into Inyo National Forest (it's always been this case) before they can camp, if they start with the Mono Pass permit. So that is for people already altitude acclimated to take that more challenging option.
Like Peter Hirst said, they are most concerned about using the permit reservation practices they have in place now to reduce use of the Sunrise parts of the JMT and the Lyell Canyon/Donahue Pass part of the JMT for those who are thru hikers.
Last if people intend to cross-country their permit obtainment is a whole different story. He limited his discussion with me for permit reservation applications where the hiker intends to use established (printed on national maps, as he said, which include Tom Harrison maps).
Again, for the time being nothing has changed. Reservations are to be processed now as they were in 2014. The preceding paragraphs is about any interim solutions made by and announced in the near future by Yosemite (nothing is concrete yet!)
I am sending the above wording to Ed Dunlavey if I misunderstood, I will correct the above posting.
