Trail resource impacts and an examination of alternative assessment techniques.
Trails are a primary recreation resource facility on which recreation activities are performed.
They provide safe access to non-roaded areas, support recreational opportunities such as hiking, biking, and wildlife observation, and protect natural resources by concentrating visitor traffic on resistant treads. Trail managers require objective information on trails and their conditions to monitor trends, direct trail maintenance efforts, and evaluate the need for visitor management and resource protection actions. This paper reviews trail impacts and different types of trail assessments, including inventory, maintenance, and condition assessment approaches. Two assessment methods, point sampling and problem assessment, are compared empirically from separate assessments of a 15-mile segment of the Appalachian Trail in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Results indicate that point sampling and problem assessment methods yield distinctly different types of quantitative information.