National Park Service Visitation and Interest: An Update Through 2009

The purpose of this paper was to examine and refute suggestions in the literature that national park visitation is on the decline. Data from a large annual national syndicated secondary dataset were examined for 2000-2009. In addition, data from Google InsightsTM related to internet searches about national park vacation travel were also used as a proxy measure to determine if interest in outdoor recreation visitation to national parks had declined. While there was evidence of some decline in visitation to national parks from 2000-2009, most of the decline occurred from 2000-2004 and there was a rebound in interest from 2004 through 2009 with the exception of a dip in 2008. Data from internet search engine queries about national parks also provided insights into visitation interest. There was some decline in interest in visiting national parks for vacation travel based on search engine inquiries; however, this decline has been cyclical and is not dramatic. 1.0 Background and Introduction The purpose of this paper was to address assertions by Pergams and Zaradic (2006 and 2008) that national park visitation is on the decline. Data from a large annual, national, and syndicated secondary dataset (Mediamark’s Topline Research Reports) were examined for the period 2000 to 2009. An additional dataset, Google InsightsTM (2011), was examined to identify trends in interest in national park visitation as reflected in Google search engine queries online. These datasets provide self-reported national park participation, visitation, and interest data from a wide range of users. The research and review of materials in this study were partially funded by a grant from the US Forest Service Northern Research Station and cooperative agreements with the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, Texas A & M University, and the University of Vermont. 2.0 Review of the Pergams and Zaradic (2006 and 2008) Literature When data are collected on an annual basis in a consistently replicated manner over a long time period, trends may be examined in detail and with confidence. However, Pergams and Zaradic’s (2006 and 2008) research findings on national park visitation, outdoor recreation, and use of electronic media during leisure time were not based on direct cause and effects. Instead, their conclusions were associated with selective changes in reported leisure time activities. For example, there is no direct linkage between park visitation, recreation activity pursuits, and media use interests in the initial Pergams and Zaradic study (2006). Instead, the authors arbitrarily picked data from a variety of different sources to reach their conclusions that people are spending less time visiting national parks because they are spending more time using electronic media. In addition, Pergams and Zaradic’s (2006) trend analysis only extended through 2003. A number of digital media activities did not become popular until the midto the late-90s and even Google (2011) did not begin its trend analysis on Internet searches until January 2004. The research findings from Pergams and Zaradic (2006) also lumped all participants into one large group and then assumed that the decline in national park visitation was equally distributed across all demographic segments. Pergams and Zaradic do not account for the possibility that new generations of potential visitors may not have be introduced to the outdoors and national parks, and therefore have simply not taken the time or to learn more about these resources. Finally, interest in the outdoors among youth may be also revealed through other measurements. For example, is the interest in the Boy and Girl Scout Programs declining? Are teens traveling more or less with their parents? By contrast, data from Mediamark’s Topline Research Reports (TRR) directly links interest in visiting national parks to media use patterns and provides detailed demographic analyses of annual visitors on a consistent basis. Likewise, other data sets such as Google InsightsTM provide long-term assessments of individual inquiries about national parks during vacation travel to determine if interest in parks has declined.