The growth of outdoor recreation:
By Scott Jordan
a bittersweet story
The field of outdoor recreation is expanding rapidly. The Outdoor Industry Association reported that Americans spent $887 billion on outdoor recreation in 2016. The U.S. Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Economic Analysis reported on Sept. 20 that the outdoor industry accounts for 2.2 percent of the nation’s gross domestic product, which amounts to $412 billion.
After hearing about the Outdoor Industry Association’s 2016 report, which said outdoor recreation was a more than $600 billion industry, I proudly posted the report on Facebook to tell the world how awesome we are. A colleague of mine replied to my post, “We’d better get on top of this thing.” So I began to wonder more about changes in the outdoor industry and how they might be addressed.
As a college professor, I am happy about this growth. It will lead to many opportunities for those studying in the field. Yet, as a community member of an area that has become an outdoor recreation destination, I have some concerns about the effects on natural resources and local cultures. Also, I wonder if our training and educational foundations in the field need to change.
I have spent the past four years on several grant-funded projects implementing as-pects of an ecotourism model in Munising, Mich., a community that has seen a substantial growth in nature-based tourism in the past four years. Munising is a small town in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula, located on a beautiful protected harbor on the south shore of Lake Superior. It is now surrounded by national forest and is a gateway community for Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore. Like many rural communities, Munising has had a chal- challenged economy, with a history of using local natural resources for economic development. Historically, the timber industry had been present in the area, which created an off-and-on economy. Iron smelting, paper milling, and the development of wood products such as the Munising Woodworks Company had provided enough to keep this community alive but not thriving. The woodworks company went out of business in the mid-1960s, which sent the community searching for a new form of income.
The National Park Service (NPS) established Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore in 1966. This park includes a scenic shoreline that extends from Munising to the small town of Grand Marais. These two communities are connected by a once-gravel State Highway 58 (H 58). Once the park was established, a plan was developed to pave H 58. The NPS stated that once this happened, the area would see an increase in visitors that would boost the local economy. The pavement of H 58 was completed in 2012, and NPS was correct: During the summer of 2015, over 2 million visitors came to the area and depended on Munising’s hospitality.
The Sustainable Ecotourism Organization (SEO) was developed to educate about and assist with problems that had accompanied the local expansion of the nature-based tourism in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and to advise businesses on using sustainable practices. Two years ago, the SEO worked with three separate stakeholder groups to gain an understanding of their separate issues associated with tourism and educate them on sustainable tourism practices. These stakeholder groups included outdoor recreation service providers and support industries, local government officials, and community members. Relationships among the groups were negative, and communication among them had been limited. A primary concern was that the community’s sense of place had become challenged. Beaches, trails, and waterfalls are now crowded, but at one time, locals could visit these places and be alone. Community members were also concerned about trash left along roads and trails, and that not everyone felt they could capitalize on this new economy.
Community members have become empowered to work in cooperation with local nature-based businesses and the local government. Through SEO, community members have begun a recycling program, are educating locals on the use of alternative energies, were able to get Leave No Trace to visit Munising and provide workshops, and have begun to develop their distribution of locally grown foods. This success has helped people in Munising to feel more optimistic about visitor traffic, and the tone toward visitors has become positive for the most part.
Scott Jordan, Ph.D., is an assistant professor at Northern Michigan University and coordinator of Outdoor Recreation Leadership and Management.
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