Community participation in outdoor recreation and the development of Millennium Greens in England

A growth in community participation (CP) in outdoor recreation provision and maintenance emerged from the post-war voluntary movement but from the 1970s, discrete initiatives were spawned in the context of management experiments, threats to urban open space from development, the enhancement of forestry recreation opportunities and European funding to remoter rural areas. A shift in the style of government from an executive to an enabling role in the 1980s and 1990s has formalized CP in public policy. This has been exploited in CP for the rights of way system and in the provision of new recreation areas: Millennium Greens. An assessment of some of the characteristics of CP in Millennium Greens is provided in relation to motivations for their development, the support of the community, the social characteristics of those affected, their spatial distribution and raised expectations where schemes have been unsuccessful. It is concluded that some executive state controls over such schemes are necessary to ensure their effective operation but this too can be enhanced by involving communities in policy formulation as well as in development and implementation. There is some evidence to suggest that governmental enabling policies benefit those who are already most enabled relative to the more marginal sectors of society and this issue merits further research.     

Ethnic factors and the use of public outdoor recreation areas: The case of Mexican Americans

Abstract

This study investigated the effects of subculture, marginality, and perceived discrimination on use of selected public outdoor recreation areas. The assimilation perspective from the sociology literature provided theoretical guidance for the study. These concepts were treated as different types of social distance (cultural distance, socioeconomic distance, and intergroup distance). Each was hypothesized to affect the use of outdoor recreation areas. Data for this analysis came from telephone interviews conducted with 1057 households in Maricopa and Gila counties in Arizona. The analysis was conducted using a subsample of respondents of Mexican ancestry. The results support the socioeconomic, or marginality, hypothesis. There was less support for the subcultural, or ethnicity, hypothesis. There was no support for the perceived discrimination hypothesis. Research implications and recommendations are discussed.     

Urban recreation research: An overview

Despite the fact that the population of the United States ha shifted from largely rural to largely urban in this century, the commitment to research in recreation, inadequate as it is, has remained in the hinterlands. There is no critical mass of recreation researchers focusing on urban recreation as there now is focused on outdoor recreation. Urban recreation studies have been noncumulative in nature due to the wide range their sponsors, staff, substantive topics, lack of generalizability, and inevitable tensions between practitioners and researchers. Ironically, urban recreational research, and support of it, has diminished in this country at the same time that there has been an increasing concern for such information and knowledge. The future looks bleak insofar as the development of a strong, major, national urban recreation research program is concerned.     

Instant‐count sampling: A technique for estimating recreation use in municipal settings

Instant‐count sampling was tested on four municipal recreation areas in Athens, Georgia. Users were counted instantaneously on the areas at randomly selected times. From these counts, estimates of use and standard errors were achieved with a minimum of sampling time required. Errors ranged from 10.2 to 37.8 percent of estimated use and did not exceed 23.6 percent for total use.     

Attitudes toward the use of designated versus non‐designated urban recreation space

Interviews were conducted in Kitchener‐Waterloo, Ontario, at eight different recreation areas. These were classified as either designated or nondesignated recreation areas. The interview was designed to obtain information regarding demographic characteristics of the user, attitudes toward the use of urban recreation areas (both playgrounds and areas that are not designated as recreational in character), reasons for choosing a particular recreation site and what users considered to be part of an ideal recreation area. Information gathered by the interview method was supplemented by a series of observations. Results indicated a significant difference between age and reasons for nonattendance at designated play areas. Differences in use by sex were, however, not significant.     

Age of first hunting experience: Results from a nationwide recreation survey

Abstract

Hunting participation, as indicated in the 1983 Nationwide Recreation Survey, is examined to determine the relationship between age of first hunting experience and adult level of participation. A statistically significant association between these two variables is found. In addition, more than 83 percent of those who hunt began their involvement by 18 years of age. The findings have implications for future hunting participation and the provision of programs for hunters.     

Voluntary association membership of outdoor recreationists: An exploratory study

Abstract

Research on the political activity of outdoor recreationists has focused primarily on their associational affiliations and concern for the environment. This article reviews literature on theories of collective behavior, recreation motivations, and environmental concern. The study considers outdoor recreation as a social movement and investigates relationships between incentives for voluntary membership in environmental and outdoor recreation associations, motivations for participation in outdoor recreation activities, and environmental concern. Members of associations were found to be significantly different than nonmembers on several variables including value for outdoor recreation, incentives for association membership, intellectual motivations for outdoor recreation, environmental concern, education level, and age. Results suggest that association efforts to obtain instrumental benefits, or public goods that accrue to all of society, are a primary incentive for outdoor recreationists to join voluntary associations. A common thread of intellectual pursuit distinguished members from nonmembers, suggesting that intellectual benefits may help define the relationship between outdoor recreation and associational affiliation behaviors.     

发展梧州区域休闲产业,实现产业转移“软着陆”

近年来,休闲产业日益得到社会各界的关注并发展起来,产生了积极的经济效益和社会效益。在产业转移的大潮中,因其无限的渗透性,是承接产业转移的有效方式之一。梧州市优美的山水风光、突出的人文资源和丰富的地域文化,是其发展休闲产业的比较优势。文章通过分析梧州市发展休闲产业的必要性及可行性,进而提出发展区域休闲产业,承接产业转移＂软着陆＂的对策。     

Modeling Overnight Recreation Trip Choice: Application of a Repeated Nested Multinomial Logit Model

In this paper we apply the repeated nested multinomial logit model, a version of a random utility model (RUM), to estimate the choice of an overnight versus single day recreation trip, along with the other usual choice of which of the sites to visit, and less typically, the choice of whether to participate (in our application – to fish) at all. We also find statistically significant income effects in the empirical results. The application is to Atlantic Salmon fishing and the data set is for Maine resident angler's fishing trips to rivers in Maine and Canada.     

Tourism in the system of industrial society

Recreation and tourism are integral parts of the whole industrial social system. Viewed thus, tourism, so successful in the past two decades, seems clearly doomed to radical change. Many signs in the universe of work-habitate-leisure-travel indicate that the present system does not satisfy the human needs of traveler, host, and ultimately the social system. One inevitable result of forecast change, is a new, humane understanding of leisure and tourism; one should begin forging it before the opportunity for choice and reason disappears.