Parks and People: Managing Outdoor Recreation at Acadia National Park

Preface

Preface Visits to the U.S. national parks total nearly 300 million annually. Over two million visits per year are accommodated at Acadia National Park alone. While we should celebrate the popularity of national parks as a clear reflection of the enjoyment they generate and their importance in society, this popularity also presents a growing challenge: Parks are to be protected as well as enjoyed. Moreover, the quality of the visitor experience also must be maintained for parks to be appreciated fully and to foster the public support that ultimately is needed to ensure park protection. Use of parks and related areas can cause impacts to natural and cultural resources, including trampling of fragile vegetation, soil compaction and erosion, water pollution, disturbance of wildlife, and loss of cultural artifacts. Visitor use also can degrade the quality of the park experience through crowding and congestion , conflicting uses, and the aesthetic implications of the damage to park resources as noted above. How much and what types of visitor use can be accommodated in national parks and related areas before impacts to park resources and the quality of the visitor experience become unacceptable? This fundamental question is a vital component of managing parks and often is addressed under the rubric of “carrying capacity.” Several frameworks have been developed to help guide analysis and application of carrying capacity as applied to parks and related areas. While subtle differences may be found among these frameworks, they all incorporate a management-by-objectives approach that involves (1) formulating management objectives or desired conditions and associated indicators and standards of quality, (2) monitoring indicator variables, and (3) managing park resources and visitors to ensure that standards of quality are maintained . This conceptual approach can help guide analysis of carrying capacix P R E F A C E x ity and management of outdoor recreation more broadly. Application of this approach can be supported and “informed” by a program of research. Acadia National Park has been a leader in applying this management-byobjectives approach, and has supported a program of natural and social science research as a foundation for this work. This book describes elements of this program of research, including its research and management implications . While the methods, findings, and implications of this research apply directly to Acadia, the lessons learned extend to the broader system of parks and related areas. This book draws heavily on the work of many people. Authors of each chapter are found in the table of contents. John Daigle at the University of Maine along with his student Min Kim and colleagues Carole Zimmerman and James Pol have conducted a series of studies on the increasingly important issue of planning and managing transportation at Acadia and parks in general, as well as a study of visitor-caused impacts to vegetation on the summit of Cadillac Mountain. Jeff Marion of the U.S. Geological Survey and Virginia Tech University along with his students Kerri Cahill, Jeremy Wimpey, and Logan Park have conducted inventories and assessments of visitor-caused impacts to soils and vegetation on park trails and campsites, and explored visitor preferences applied to alternative management practices . Margaret Littlejohn of the University of Idaho conducted a baseline survey of park visitors as part of the National Park Service (nps) Visitor Services Project. Steve Lawson of Virginia Tech University, along with his student Steve Bullock, studied the visitor experience at the summit of Cadillac Mountain. I have been pleased to conduct a long-term program of research at Acadia under the auspices of the University of Vermont’s Park Studies Laboratory . This work has been conducted with several colleagues, including Bill Valliere, Wayne Freimund, Dave Lime, Jeff Marion, Steve Lawson, and Laura Anderson, as well as graduate students Ben Wang, Jim Bacon, Steve Lawson, Peter Newman, Megha Budruk, Daniel Laven, Jeff Hallo, Rebecca Stanfield McCown, Carena van Riper, Dan Abbe, Kelly Goonan, Ben Minteer, Jennifer Morrissey, and Logan Park. None of the work of the Park Studies Laboratory would have been possible without the strong and progressive leadership of nps staff at Acadia. The park provided much of the needed research funding, but also provided logistical support and, most importantly, contributed in substantive ways to the design, execution, and interpretation of this program of research. Special appreciation is expressed to Charlie Jacobi, my colleague and friend, who has vigorously led the program of outdoor recreation management at the park for many years...