One of the trees in the grove, the Grizzly Giant, a massive, battered and gangly sequoia, is estimated to be 1,800 years old (“plus or minus a few centuries,” according to the National Park Service). Early last week, just a few days before visitors were welcomed back into the grove, a deer was calmly enjoying the shade of the trunk, which measures nearly 100 feet in circumference, one-third of a football field’s length.

Partly financed with a $20 million gift from the Yosemite Conservancy, a private philanthropic organization, the renovation involved ripping up nearly an acre and a half of pavement near the trees where cars and trams would pass and replacing it with walking paths made of packed dirt held together with resin. Visitors are now encouraged to take a free shuttle bus from a new parking lot a 10-minute drive away (there is still some accessible parking for disabled visitors at the grove itself). The clanging, smoke-spewing diesel trams which previously took visitors on a tour of the grove have been removed.

“We are not trying to take away anyone’s freedom,” said Scott Gediman, a spokesman for the park. “Take your car, but then park it. And walk.”

With bark that can be more than one foot thick and high levels of tannins to repel insects, giant sequoias are regarded by experts as some of the world’s most resilient trees. Close to 130 million trees of other species died in California over the past decade after being weakened by a five-year drought, but no mature giant sequoias perished, according to Sue Beatty, a restoration ecologist who helped lead the project. Even so, Ms. Beatty and other experts said they saw some signs of stress in the sequoias.