Sustainable Trail Management in Costa Rica National Park: The use of photography in trail surface decisions under tropical rainforest conditions

              Vol. 7 Nº1 págs. 29-42. 2009
www.pasosonline.org
© PASOS. Revista de Turismo y Patrimonio Cultural. ISSN 1695-7121
Sustainable Trail Management in Costa Rica National Parks: The use
of photography for trail surfacing decisions under tropical rainforest
conditions 1
Juan A Aguirre G.ii
Universidad Latinoamericana de Ciencia y Tecnologia (Costa Rica)
Resumen: El Parque Nacional Volcán Poas (PNVP) es el parque mas visitado de Costa Rica. Sus
facilidades físicas, accesibilidad, y su proximidad a las mayores ciudades del país hacen del PNVP un
destino preferido por visitantes locales y extranjeros. Ademas de su cono volcánico activo, los senderos
del parque son muy apreciados. Las condiciones lluviosas que prevalecen a través del año y la alta visi-tación
anual hace muy importante determinar las preferencias de los visitantes por el tipo de superficie
para poder garantizar la sostenibilidad de los senderos del parque. El propósito de este estudio fue el de
explorar la viabilidad de utilizar fotos en combinación, con encuestas para identificar las características
socio-demográficos y otras variables relacionadas y que afectan la selección del tipo de superficie pre-ferida
por los visitantes en condiciones de alta precipitación , con el fin de poder indicar a la administra-ción
del PNVP, como mejorar las decisiones y asignación de los recursos presupuestarios relacionados
con el diseño, construcción, conservación y mantenimiento de los senderos del parque. El estudio se
realizó durante los meses de mayo, junio y julio del 2005.
Palabras clave: Fotografía; Selección del tipo de superficie; Senderos; Selección; Condición lluviosa;
Costa Rica.
Abstract: Volcan Poas National Park (VPNP) is Costa Rica’s most visited park. Its facilities, accessi-bility,
and proximity to the major cities of the country make VPNP a preferred destination for local and
foreigner visitors. Aside from its active volcanic cone, the park trails are a major asset. The extremely
wet conditions prevailing throughout the year and heavy visitation made it essential to determine visi-tor’s
trail surface preferences to guarantee park trail sustainability. The purpose of this study was to
explore the feasibility of using photos in combination with a regular survey to identify the socio-demographic
characteristics and other trail related variables that affect trail surface selection to guide
management decisions and resource allocation related to trail design, construction, and maintenance. The
study was conducted during May, June and July of 2005.
Keywords: Photos; Trail surface selection; Rainy conditions, Costa Rica.
ii • Juan A Aguirre es Decano de Extension Universitaria y profesor de Emprendedurismo. Facultad de Ciencias
Empresariales. Universidad Latinoamericana de Ciencia y Tecnologia. San Jose. Costa Rica.. E-mail:
jaguirre@ulacit.ac.cr - jaguirre@racsa.co.cr
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Introduction
Tropical rainforests are characterized by
their low resistance and intermediate to
high resilience to impact associated with
human visitation. Trail erosion caused by
recreational use threatens the resources in
many parks. Managers of wilderness areas
are normally mandated to assess recrea-tional
use impacts on trail erosion and de-gradation.
The assessment of erosion in-cludes
a body of work that spans almost 40
years in developed countries, some exam-ples
of the methods used for trail erosion
assessment being: condition class assess-ment,
morphometric assessments, cen-sus/
tally assessments, census of erosional
events, and photographic assessments us-ing
stereo photography to name a few (Bay-field
and Lloyd 1973; Bratton et al, 1979;
Jewell and Hammitt, 2000; Giles, 2002;
Turton, 2005).
The idea of trade of is essential to visi-tor’s
surface choices. Normative research in
outdoor recreation is conventionally con-ducted
using quantitative methods that
generate numerical estimates of respon-dent
norms or evaluative standards of qual-ity
for park and outdoor recreation condi-tions.
Cognitive mapping as a means of
gathering data related to recreational use
patterns (RUP) and impacts on the hiking
trail system alludes to an individual's abili-ty
to construct a mental representation of
the geographical environment. Visitor
management in parks, wilderness, and
other protected areas requires information
about visitor-environment interactions and
particularly the distribution and flow of
visitors in space and time (Manning et al,
2005; Lankford et al, 2004; Cole and
Daniel, 2004; Leung and Marion, 2000).
The importance of trail analysis and
visitors impact on trails has been well
documented around the world (Holden,
2002; Nepal and Nepal, 2001; Bratton and
Hickler, 2002; Magro, 2003; Ploner and
Brandenburg, 2004; Bruehler and Sonde-gaard,
2004; Hornsten, 2000). The work in
Belize and Costa Rica clearly demonstrates
the importance of adequate trail manage-ment
in the overall management of any
national park (Farrell and Marion, 2001;
Lueng and Marion, 2000).
Many forms of assessing trail problems
have been use over the past half a century.
Many methods have relied on direct mea-surement
of the problems and the others on
interviews with visitors. The very recent
advances in digital photography open new
options not available before. The blend of
immediate recollection with well structured
traditional survey techniques has been
pointed out by many outdoor recreation
researchers as offering great potential
(Manning and Freimund, 2004; Stewart
and Floyd, 2004).
The used of photography may be recent
but definitely not new. Several studies have
demonstrated that altering the format
(question wording or presentation format)
can alter responses obtained from norma-tive
questions. It appears that closed for-mats,
like photographs, offer a cognitively
easier and more meaningful approach. In
the case of Image Capture Technology
(ICT), respondents indicated that the im-ages
served as useful reminders of their
visit and helped them to articulate their
norms. The use of visitors employing pho-tography
is becoming normal technique as
a “recollection and evaluation of the expe-rience”
particularly in the United States
and around the world (Hall and Roggen-buck,
2002; Freimund et al, 2002; Vistad,
2004; Turner and Funicelli, 2000; Lueng
and Marion, 2000; Gimblett, 1987; Hem et
al, 2004; Arriaza, et al 2005; Fairweather
and Swaffield, 2001; Taylor et al, 1998;
Flick and Taylor, 2002; Stedman et al,
2003; Loeffler, 2004; Nelson, et al, 2001).
Two studies, Rollins and Mcallum and
Kim et al, reinforce the idea that digital
photography could be used in assessing the
visitor’s surface preferences under very
rainy conditions at VPNP. The first study
used the normative approach involving
digital photography in a recreation setting
to depict progressively more intense
changes in conditions, and in the second
photos of different methods were used for
selecting impact indicators for trail man-agement
conditions by comparing a photo
survey method (PSM) with a written sur-vey
method (WSM). The major photo com-ponents
in order of importance were six:
area of large rocks on trail, area of wood
steps, area of bare roots, area of bare soil,
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area of small stones, and area of stone
steps (Rollins and Mcallum, 2001; Kim et
al, 2003).
In Costa Rica, because of the heavy visi-tation
pressure and the permanent short-age
of funds for trail maintenance, the na-tion
national park system needs new ways
to reduce cost and sharpen management
decisions related to trail management.
Therefore, the purpose of this study was to
explore the feasibility of using photos in
combination with a regular survey to iden-tify
the socio-demographic characteristics of
the visitors, their reasons for coming to the
park, trail physical characteristics, and the
trail surface preferences as a result of the
heavy rain conditions affecting trail use in
VPNP to guide management decisions and
resource allocation related to trail design,
construction and maintenance.
Objectives and Hypothesis of the Study
The objective of the study was: To de-termine
and evaluate the affect of socio-demographic
characteristics and how these
elements affect the visitor’s trail surface
preferences under the heavy rains which
affect VPNP every year from May to De-cember.
The hypothesis of the study was: The
visitors to VPNP, local and foreign, given
their socio-demographic characteristics and
reasons for coming to the park, under the
very humid and rainy climatic conditions
prevailing almost from May to December at
VPNP, will prefer hard over natural sur-faces.
Materials and Methods
Location of the Study.
Volcan Poas National Park is located in
Costa Rica’s Central Mountain Range, 37
km north of the city of Alajuela, the second
largest city of the country. It was estab-lished
in September 24, 1970, and domi-nates
an area of 6506 hectares. The precipi-tation
in the park fluctuates between 3500
and 4500 millimeters per year, most of
which falls between the months of May and
early December. Of the 273 thousands visi-tors
that visited the park in 2005, 51% are
foreigners and 49% locals (VPNP, 2005;
Aguirre, 2006; Dobles Zeledon, 2005).
Sampling Size and Method of Selection.
The interviews were conducted during
the months of May, June and July of 2005
months that represent, the beginning, take
off and stability of the rainy season in the
park. The sampling size, was determine
using the “rule of a minimum of 5 surveys”
or what is known as the subject to variables
ratio(STV) per item, when multivariate
type of analysis is conducted to have a 95%
probability level or a 5% error. (Bryan and
Yarnold,2003).
However by personal decision and to be
on the safe side, since there was not pre-vious
studies of this nature in the country ,
we multiply by a factor 5, the “STV” rule,
meaning that for every item measure we
finish with 25 surveys.
The decision made, to increase by a fac-tor
of five the “STV rule”, it was felt that
provided a safety net big enough to make
Type I and Type II errors, unlikely. The
second decision was to split the sample in
50% locals and 50% foreigners, to make
sure we respect the 51% foreigners to 49%
locals proportion, base on park data.
The surveys were completed by 690 fo-reigners
and 690 locals. The interviews
were conducted during May, June and July
of 2005 and conducted as visitors were get-ting
ready to leave the park premises at the
main visitor center and selected randomly.
The ninety days of field work, due to the
money limitation and the permission pro-vided
were split in 3 periods of ten days,
meaning that the first period, of 10 days of
interviews was completed in the first ten
days of May, the second period in the
second ten days of June and the third pe-riod
in the last ten days of July, looking to
replicate a month and have visitors of all
the ninety days of field work.
The visitors to be interview, were se-lected
randomly, picking and approaching
every tenth person leaving the visitor cen-ter.
Those that refuse to be interviewed
were replace by the next individual. One
“real” problem was that in national parks
heavily visited like Volcan Poas, counting
visitors is somewhat of a physical chal-lenges,
so we adopted the strategy of
groups of 3, while two people interviewed,
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another one was, more or less counting.
Survey Instrument Design.
A “Likert type scale” was used in which
1 meant either not important, totally unsa-tisfactory,
or an equivalent condition and
10 the other extreme, very important, very
satisfactory or an equivalent condition, as
suggested by Kachigan and others (Kachi-gan,
1991; Johnson and Creech, 1983; Gray
and Kraenzle, 1998). The experimental
questionnaire use was pre-tested and ver-sions
in Spanish and English were availa-ble
and it contain a number of
The general structure of the survey in-cluded
the following sections:
1. Socio-demographics characteristics.
2. Reasons for coming to the park.
3. A set of photos depicting representa-tive
pictures of the major types of surfaces
used in the trails of VPNP for dry and wet
climatic conditions.
4. A special questions section: a) How
would you rank the trails in VPNP? b)
How would you describe your hiking expe-rience
and c) How would you rank your
general satisfaction with your visit to
VPNP?
5. Willingness to Pay Section: The wil-lingness
to pay section started with the
following statement: “Trail maintenance
cost under tropical conditions is normally
very difficult because of the heavy rain
conditions that create a need for additional
investment and maintenance due to the
additional drainage, surfacing, and erosion
control practices that are usually needed”
and question: “Would you be willing to pay
and additional amount for trail mainten-ance
over and above the entrance fee that
you were charging to enter the park”. Poss-ible
answers were “yes” or “no”. If the an-swer
was yes the question “How much?
(Dollars or Colons) are you willing to pay”
followed. If the answer was no respondents
were asked to explain “Why not?”
Analytical Procedure.
The descriptive statistical analysis con-sisted
of an ANOVA analysis to compare
local and foreign visitors that included a
Tukey's family error test. The data was
prepared first in an Excel database and
later transferred to Minitab for Windows
Version No 12. An ordinal logistic regres-sion
with a normit/probit link using the
Pample procedure was utilized to detect the
relative importance of the variables on the
variable trail rating given the ordinal na-ture
of the likert scale using a forward eli-mination
process. An indication of the rela-tive
size of the effects within a probit equa-tion
came from multiplying the probit coef-ficient
by the standard deviation of the
independent variables, calculation that it
would show the changes in the inverse of
the cumulative standard normal transfor-mation
of the dependent variable for one
standard deviation increase in the inde-pendent
variable (Pample, 2000).
Six trail locations were selected with the
support of the park maintenance unit and
the administration of the park, and digital
pictures taken. A one page composite was
developed. Photo one represented a natural
surface photo two a concrete surface, three
a red volcanic gravel trail with a very slight
gradient, four an asphalt surface, five a
large gravel crush stone surface on a flat
terrain, and photo six a cinder block sur-face.
The picture composite was shown to
the interviewee at two moments during the
interview when they were requested to
express their trail surface preference under
dry and rainy weather conditions (photo 1).
Results
Table 1 presents the basic socio-demographic
data of the VPNP foreign and
local visitors. In general the average visitor
is between 28 and 32 years of age, a uni-versity
graduate, and within the ratio of 40
% females to 60% males. For those that
reported their average monthly income, in
the case of the Costa Ricans, which were
74% of all of those interview was US$1270,
in the case of the Unites States 51% of
those interviewed reported an average
monthly income of US$8230, in the case of
Europeans, 67% of those interviews re-ported
and average monthly income of
US$5230 and all the others nationalities
reported an average monthly income of
US$2531. In terms of the reasons for com-ing
to the park the most important reasons
to visit the park were to observe the active
volcanic crater and nature. The foreign
visitor added some hiking and trekking,
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while the Costa Ricans come to enjoy a
leisurely moment in the company of friends
and family as can observed by the ratings
awarded to the different activities.
Table 2 gives the ratings awarded to the
different elements of trail design by the two
groups. The results indicate local and for-eign
visitors give basically the same rating
to layout, length, clearing width, lookouts,
and trails maps. The local visitors rank
higher thread width, surface material, gra-dient,
rest areas, signage, trail interpreta-tion
and points of interest.
Table 3 results revealed that under dry
conditions (no rain) the rating of all six
trails is between 5.6 and 7.4, with the as-phalt
surfaces receiving the lowest scores
by local and foreign visitors, followed by
cinder block surfaces. The con-crete
and gravel surfaces re-ceived
the highest ranking from
7 to 7.8. The natural trail sur-faces
get a rating of 6.7 by lo-cals
and 6.5 by foreigners. For-eign
and local visitor's ratings
for asphalt and cinder blocks
are significantly different be-tween
the groups while all the
others are not.
Table 3 also presents the re-sults
of comparing within each
survey group- locals and foreign
visitors- preference ratings for
trail surfacing material under
dry and wet (rainy) conditions.
Foreign visitor’s rating for nat-ural
surfaces reduces under
rainy climatic conditions from
6.7 to 3.9 or a rating reduction
of 41.7%. The concrete surface
rating remains the same. Vol-canic
gravel surface rating pre-ference
reduces from 7.3 to 6.
The asphalt surface preference
rating increases from 5.6 to 7.
Stone gravel surface rating
reduces from 7.5 to 6.7 and
cinder block surface rating in-crease
from 5.8 to 6.9.
In the case of local visitors
the natural surface (photo 1)
rating reduces from 6.5 to 3.2 or
50.7% and the asphalt surface
rating increases from 6.5 to 8.1,
or an increase of 24.6% from
dry to wet (rainy) condition.
The concrete surface rating
increases from 7.2 to 7.7 and
the cinder block rating increase 6.9 to 7.8.
In the cases of the volcanic and stone gra-vel
surfaces (photos 3 and 5) the ratings
decrease from 7.4 to 6.6 and from 7.8 to 6.7
respectively.
Table 4 presents the results of the wil-lingness
to pay an additional amount for
trail maintenance. The results indicate that
roughly half of the visitors in both cases are
willing to pay an additional amount to be
used specifically for trail maintenance. The
Table 1. Main Characteristics of the Foreign and Local Visitors.
Foreign Local
Basic Socio Demographics Visitor Visitor
Foreign Local
% %
below 30 65.2 52.9
30 to 50 24.6 41.2
over 50 10.1 5.9
Average 28.0 32.0 years
Education Level
below HS 87.0 70.6
University or over 13.0 29.4
Education 100.0 100.0
Females 37.7 41.2
Males 62.3 58.8
Sex 100.0 100.0
Rating of the Reasons for Coming to the Park
Mean Mean F P
Observe Nature 8 9 11.97 0.008
See the Volcanic Crater 10 10 0.56 0.453
Walk the Trails 7 7 4.00 0.046
Hiking and Trekking 6 5 36.94 0.000
Walk with the Family 6 7 10.49 0.001
Walk with Friends 7 8 10.25 0.001
See the Animals 8 7 2.63 0.105
See the Birds 8 7 24.04 0.000
See the Plants and Flowers 8 7 18.91 0.000
Rest and Relax 7 7 0.67 0.414
Learn about nature 7 6 8.83 0.003
Learn biodiversity 7 7 1.46 0.227
Learn about the volcano 8 7 14.93 0.000
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overall trail rating and the overall enjoy-ment
of the hiking experience are in the
range of 8 to 9 in a scale of 10, which are
relatively speaking very high ratings if
they are compared with the individual rat-ings
observed in other categories and that
in the case of visitors locals or foreigners
that are willing to pay and additional
amount for trail maintenance the mean
amount difference is not statistically signif-icantly
different at the 95% level and it
ranges on the average from US$2.30 in the
case of the foreign visitors and US$1.63 in
the case of local visitors. This represents a
sobering reminder for those that advocate
“extracting” the most out of the visitors to
protected areas.
The probit models for foreign visitors
are presented in table 5 and they indicate
that all the coefficients conforming to the
final probit model were significant at the
95% probability level or better. In the case
of the foreign visitors the variables enter-ing
the final model were: Age, Education,
B1 or photograph number one depicting the
natural trail during the dry season, B4 or
the photograph which depicts the asphalt
surface during the dry season, C3 or the
clearing width, the third component in-cluded
in the trail design section, C6 or
percent gradient, the sixth component in-cluded
in the trail design section, D1 or
photograph number one depicting the natu-ral
trail during the rainy season, and D4
photograph depicting the asphalt surface
during the rainy season.
In the case of table 6 which covers local
visitors, all of the coefficients entering the
final probit model were significant at the
95% probability level or better, while the
variables entering the final model were:
Age, Education, B4 or photograph depicting
the asphalt surface during the dry season,
C3 or clearing width the third component
included in the trail design section, C2 or
trail length, the second component included
in the trail design section, and D4 photo-graph
depicting the asphalt surface during
the rainy season.
Table 7 indicates using Pample’s sug-gested
procedure that the estimated coeffi-cient
ranking in importance of each of the
independent variables. In the case of the
foreign visitor the two most important va-riables
were age and C3: clearing width,
the third component included in the trail
design section and in the case of the locals
visitors the variables were: age and level of
educations (years of schooling equivalent).
The important element of the probit analy-sis
portrayed in table seven is the fact that
four variables: age, education, B4 or photo-graph
depicting the asphalt surface during
the dry season and D4 or photograph de-picting
the asphalt surface during the rainy
season were included in both probit models.
Table 2 . Rating the Trail Design and Management Elements.
Foreign Local
Features Visitor Visitor
Foreign Local F P
Trail Layout 8 9 4.87 0.28
Trail Length 8 8 0.66 0.418
Clearing width 7 8 0.75 0.387
Tread width 7 8 21.36 0.000
Surface Material 8 9 30.35 0.000
Gradient 7 8 3.85 0.050
Rest Areas 7 8 23.17 0.000
Lookouts 9 9 0.39 0.532
Signage 8 9 6.56 0.011
Points of Interest 8 9 6.54 0.011
Trail Interpretation 8 9 11.31 0.001
Trail Maps 8 8 0.33 0.567
Results confirm by Tukey’s family error test.
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Table 3 Trail Surface Rating
Under Dry Conditions Under Rainy Conditions
Foreign Local Foreign Local
Visitor Visitor F P Visitor Visitor F P
Photo 1 6.7 6.5 0.5 0.479 Photo 1 3.9 3.2 6.62 0.01
Photo 2 7 7.2 0.92 0.337 Photo 2 7 7.7 7.5 0.006
Photo 3 7.3 7.4 0.15 0.699 Photo 3 6 6.6 7.21 0.007
Photo 4 5.6 6.5 11.95 0.001 Photo 4 7 8.1 18.42 0.000
Photo 5 7.5 7.8 2.19 0.139 Photo 5 6.7 6.7 0.02 0.882
Photo 6 5.8 6.9 18.54 0.000 Photo 6 6.9 7.8 13.93 0.000
Under Dry vrs Rainy Conditions Under Rainy Conditions
Foreign Foreign Local Local
Visitor Visitor F P Visitor Visitor F P
Dry Rainy Dry Rainy
Photo 1 6.7 3.9 264.28 0.000 Photo 1 6.5 3.2 122.73 0.000
Photo 2 7 7 0.00 1.000 Photo 2 7.2 7.7 2.05 0.153
Photo 3 7.3 6 96.71 0.000 Photo 3 7.4 6.6 9.83 0.002
Photo 4 5.6 7 64.26 0.000 Photo 4 6.5 8.1 25.29 0.000
Photo 5 7.5 6.7 29.15 0.000 Photo 5 7.8 6.7 12.13 0.001
Photo 6 5.8 6.9 53.47 0.000 Photo 6 6.9 7.8 8.24 0.004
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Table 5. Foreign Visitors Ordinal Logistic Regression
Ordinal Logistic Regression Table
Predictor Coef StDev Z P
Const(1) 1,8722 0,2978 6,29 0,000
Const(2) 2,4565 0,2819 8,71 0,000
Const(3) 3,5573 0,2855 12,46 0,000
Const(4) 4,1747 0,2916 14,32 0,000
Const(5) 5,3566 0,3088 17,35 0,000
Const(6) 6,1718 0,3213 19,21 0,000
Age -0,19733 0,03785 -5,21 0,000
Educatio -0,32208 0,06932 -4,65 0,000
B1 0,03548 0,01617 2,19 0,028
B4 0,09131 0,01657 5,51 0,000
C3 -0,28808 0,02217 -12,99 0,000
C6 -0,16911 0,01820 -9,29 0,000
D1 -0,13550 0,01822 -7,44 0,000
D4 -0,11575 0,01517 -7,63 0,000
Log-likelihood = -857,587
Test that all slopes are zero: G = 504,932; DF = 8; P-Value = 0,000
Goodness-of-Fit Tests
Method Chi-Square DF P
Pearson 2685,067 394 0,000
Deviance 1715,175 394 0,000
Measures of Association:
Summary Measures
Somers' D 0,61
Goodman-Kruskal Gamma 0,61
Kendall's Tau-a 0,47
Cox & Snell(PseudoR2) 22,7%
Table 4. Trail Experience Rating and WtoP for additional Trail Maintenance
Foreign Local F P
Trail Use Related
Perceptions Visitor Visitor
Mean Value Mean Value
Overall Trail Rating 8.3 8.6 2.99 0.084
Hiking Experience 7 6.2 12.07 0.006
Overall Enjoyment
with Hiking 9 8.8 5.63 0.001
Average Amount of
Money
Willingness to Pay US$
dollars 2.3 1.67 1.88 0.171
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Table 6. Local Ordinal Logistic Regression
Predictor Coef StDev Z P
Const(1) 11.126 1.390 8.01 0.000
Const(2) 15.659 1.983 7.90 0.000
Const(3) 17.337 2.092 8.29 0.000
Age 0.8570 0.1253 6.84 0.000
Educatio -2.2417 0.2816 -7.96 0.000
B4 -0.28755 0.06324 -4.55 0.000
C2 -1.2624 0.1590 -7.94 0.000
C3 0.33914 0.07688 4.41 0.000
D4 -0.23684 0.04458 -5.31 0.000
Log-likelihood = -113.305
Test that all slopes are zero: G = 222.097, DF = 6, P-Value = 0.000
Goodness-of-Fit Tests
Method Chi-Square DF P
Pearson 2047,58 394 0.000
Deviance 2266,11 394 0.000
Measures of Association:
Summary Measures
Somers' D 0.85
Goodman-Kruskal Gamma 0.85
Kendall's Tau-a 0.61
Cox & Snell(Pseudo R2) 49.4%
Table 7. Relative Size of the Effect within the Probit
Equations for Foreign and Local Visitors, to VPNP.
Variables Ordinal Variable Estimated
Foreign Regression Standard Rank
Visitors Coefficient Deviation Value
Age -0.197 13.555 -2.674
Education -0.322 0.703 -0.226
B1 0.035 3.290 0.116
B4 0.091 3.255 0.297
C3 -0.288 2.471 -0.712
C6 -0.169 2.598 -0.439
D1 -0.136 3.234 -0.438
D4 -0.116 3.290 -0.381
Variables Ordinal Variable Estimated
Local Regression Standard Rank
Vistors Coefficient Deviation Value
Age 0.857 12.465 10.683
Education -2.242 3.060 -6.860
B4 -0.288 3.283 -0.944
C2 -1.112 2.107 -2.344
C3 0.339 2.434 0.825
D4 -0.237 2.742 -0.649
38 Sustainable Trail Management in Costa Rica National Parks: ...
PASOS. Revista de Turismo y Patrimonio Cultural, 7(1). 2009 ISSN 1695-7121
Discussion
Socio-demographics and surface selection
Traditionally, environmentalists have
argued that visitors to Costa Rica protected
areas “loved” natural trails, therefore nat-ural
trails are the “ideal” type of trail if one
is to preserve the protected areas of Costa
Rica and the tropical world. As self proc-laimed
spokesmen of the protected area’s
visitors, they seem to overlook the relation
of the visitor's socio demographics and its
potential relation with trail surface materi-al
selection, given what they come to do,
who they are, and what the park environ-ment
offers.
Volcan Poas National Park visitation
has grown by 100 thousand visitors over
the past 10 years. Visitors coming to the
park are highly educated, with income le-vels
for foreign and local visitors somewhat
above what one would expect, foreign visi-tors
coming from around 25 different coun-tries,
and 40 % females and are 50% locals
and 50% foreigners. The high level of fe-males
enjoying the outdoors and using the
trails of the park ,places a new challenge to
the park administrative authorities, tradi-tionally
oriented to cater mostly to male
backpacking visitors. The survey also rec-orded
along with young adults with ages
ranging between 15 to 20 years, many se-niors
over the age of 65 years, and a sub-stantial
group of middle age visitors. To the
above we can add a very close proximity to
some of the largest cities of the central
highlands of Costa Rica, were 65% of the
nation population resides and a 45 minute
ride from Juan Santamaria International
Airport, access that is fully paved and
represents some of the best highways in the
country.
Volcan Poas is an active volcano, and a
restriction of the National Emergency
Commission common to all the parks with
active volcanoes do not allow camping on
the park grounds. Therefore when the socio
demographics of foreign and locals visitors
are related to the reasons for coming to the
park, it is observed that foreign visitors
generally come to the park for a nature and
outdoor experience, in many cases for 2
hours or less, and locals for a family expe-rience
with a half a day time limit particu-larly
on weekends, something that is con-sistent
with the visitor weekly flow and the
restrictions specified earlier. In general the
visitors seem to want a setting designed to
enjoy a few hours of relaxation with no
mud or stress. VPNP is not a backpackers
park and this is something some people do
not understand, or do not want to. The
summary synthesis descriptively defines a
person that seem to have the ability to
identify problems and evaluated critically
what he or she is getting in terms of infra-structure,
services, and recreational oppor-tunities
at the park and that includes trail
conditions and characteristics and defines
needs and expectations in relation to trail
surfaces under very different ecological
conditions.
Implications for Management
The trail surface preferences under
heavy rains and heavy visitation, results
we are about to discuss, are framed by the
previous discussion and its logic and sup-ported
by the previous socio-economic cha-racteristics
and the behavior derived from
them. One initial statement that can be
effectively made is that under dry condi-tions
all trail surfaces seem to have similar
preference ratings by both foreign and local
visitors. The situations changes dramati-cally
when the climatic conditions change
from dry to wet (rainy). In wet conditions
the temporary preference for natural condi-tions
(Photo 1) collapses by almost 50%,
gravel surface preferences increase slightly,
and the three hard surfaces: concrete, as-phalt
and cinder blocks, increase apprecia-ble.
The message seems to be clear: in a
situation of heavy rains and high humidity
conditions, like those prevailing in the
cloud forest, nobody foreign or local seems
to want soft-natural surface trails. These
new condition raise a series of implications
for park and trail management, in the
wake of 1.7 to 1.8 million tourists that may
be arriving in 2007 of which around 1 mil-lion
will visit the country national parks
minimum once or twice during an average
stay of 11 to 14 days.
The decision to hard surface the most
heavily trafficed trails of VPNP made a
about 10 years years ago by the park ad-
Juan A. Aguirre 39
PASOS. Revista de Turismo y Patrimonio Cultural, 7(1). 2009 ISSN 1695-7121
ministration based on the premise that
climatic conditions impaired the use of
some of the parks trails during the rainy
season and increased maintenance cost,
that has been habitually severely criticized
by environmentalist, is clearly challenged
by these results and perhaps the criticism
was correct ten years ago, since no visitors
data is available for that period we can only
speculate, but as the clients constituency
looks how it looks today, the hypothesis
about natural trails preferences is not cor-rect.
The results however tend to indicate
that with the type of visitor, the normal
length of the visit, the reasons for coming
to the park, based on the responses of local
and foreign visitors it is clear that hard
surfacing the heavy traffic trails is a real
alternative for sustainable long term trail
management at VPNP.
Finally it is important to bring to the at-tention
of the reader that a new trail man-agement
strategy for VPNP is being dis-cussed
base on the outcome of this study as
this paper is being prepared, and that for
the first time the necessities of women are
seriously under consideration in the new
strategy in predominantly male oriented
society. This may not be much, but it is
enough to feel that serious management
research is beginning to be appreciated
even in a developing country like Costa
Rica.
Conclusions
1. VPNP visitors were found to be pre-dominantly
going on middle age or older,
highly educated, fairly well to do, coming
from at least 25 different countries, and
consisting of 40 to 50 % females. The high
level of females enjoying the outdoors plac-es
a new challenge to the country parks
system administrative authorities, tradi-tionally
oriented to cater to male's visitors.
2. Differences in socioeconomic charac-teristics,
reasons for coming to the park,
trail design and maintenance elements
were found between local and foreign visi-tors
to warrant the separation of the visi-tors
in locals and foreigners for analytical
purposes
3. In the case of the foreign visitors the
variables included in the model were: Age,
Education, B1 or photograph number one
depicting the natural trail during the dry
season, B4 or photograph depicting the
asphalt surface during the dry season, C3
or clearing width, the third component in-cluded
in the trail design section, C6 or
percent gradient, the sixth component in-cluded
in the trail design section, D1 or
photograph number one depicting the natu-ral
trail during the rainy season, and D4
photograph depicting the asphalt surface
during the rainy season. The composition
of the derived model suggests that behind
the foreigners visiting there is an outdoor
experience.
4. In the case of the local visitors the va-riables
included in the model were: Age,
Education, B4 or photograph depicting the
asphalt surface during the dry season, C3
or clearing width, the third component in-cluded
in the trail design section, C2 or
trail length, the second component included
in the trail design section, and D4 photo-graph
depicting the asphalt surface during
the rainy season. The composition of the
derived model suggests that the local visi-tor
comes accompany by family and friends
to enjoy nature and spend a few hours of
rest and relaxation in their company.
5. Under dry conditions all trail surfaces
seem to have similar preference ratings by
both foreign and local visitors, with two
significant exceptions: asphalt and cinder
blocks surfaces which seem to be preferred
more by locals than foreigners.
6. Under wet conditions the preference
for natural conditions collapses by almost
50%, gravel surfaces preferences increase
slightly, and the three hard surfaces: con-crete,
asphalt, and cinder blocks increase
appreciably.
7. The message seemed to be clear: In a
situation of heavy rains and high humidity
conditions, like those prevailing in the
cloud forest, nobody foreign or local visitors
seems to want soft surfaces trails.
8. Base on the results the hypothesis
that visitors to VPNP, local and foreign,
preferred the hard over the natural surface
given their socio-demographics and reasons
for coming to the park, under the very hu-mid
and rainy climatic conditions, prevail-ing
almost all year round at VPNP was
proven correct.
9. The senior management of VPNP,
based on the study findings, is developing
40 Sustainable Trail Management in Costa Rica National Parks: ...
PASOS. Revista de Turismo y Patrimonio Cultural, 7(1). 2009 ISSN 1695-7121
at this time a new strategy for trail devel-opment,
construction, and maintenance
that includes catering to the ever growing
female constituency and rationalizing the
use of government resources coming from
the central government budget always in-sufficient
to meet park management needs.
10. Finally the use of photos prove to be
a excellent way to objectively evaluated
visitors surface preference, taking trail
management a step further.
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NOTAS
1 The author expressly wishes to recognize the
support of: Ing Rafael Gutierrez, Head of the Cen-tral
Volcanic Highlands Conservation Area and
Volcan Poas National Park, and chief administrator
Ing Juan Dobles Zeledon for encouraging, support-ing,
permitting and actively using the results of the
study in the new Volcan Poas National Park man-agement
plan being developed at this time. To Sara
Shempel for her editorial corrections.
Recibido: 19 de junio de 2007
Reenviado: 22 de noviembre de 2008
Aceptado: 21 de diciembre de 2008
Sometido a evaluación por pares anónimos