REVIEW - TIME COMPLICATIONS

• Leisure time

• Recreation as activity within Leisure time

• Tourism as a subset of Recreation

REVIEW - TIME COMPLICATIONS

• Increases in Leisure time - personal and societal

• Movement away from standard ‘stereotyped’ packaging of time

• Poor data base to support understanding of changes

OTHER COMPLICATIONS

• Impact of Technological Forces

– Discussed impact on hours worked • greater productivity, therefore fewer workers in previous job occupations.

• More jobs available

• trade-off of time for money

• May be a limit to this

– Discussed impact on access• change from emphasis on group access to individual access

• average Canadian family has over 2 cars

• Impact of Technological Forces• More indirect impacts

– Impact on type of work

• perhaps based on a myth• technology has allowed movement away from physical effort - at least

less than in the past• assumption that hard physical labour will lead to a more passive style of

recreation (and vice versa)• link to theories of why people recreate and what activities they will

select

• Impact of Technological Forces• More indirect impacts

– Impact on type of opportunities

• change in activities - linked to improvement (ease of operation in activities (golf, tennis, squash)

• new materials, analysis of equipment

• new activities combined with the above (windsurfing, snowboarding)

• Impact of Social Forces• Direct and indirect impacts

– Longevity

• In 1930, the retirement age for Canadians was 65

• In 1930, the life expectancy for Canadians was 64

• In the 90’s - retirement age (official) is 65

• life expectancy (average) is 76

• Retirement time is discretionary time

• Impact of Social Forces• Direct and indirect impacts

– Age Structure• Linked to longevity

• By 2000, the median age in Canada will be 37• The number of seniors will be equal to the number of people under the

age of 15• The major ‘bulge’ of the population will be in their forties• Link this to early retirement or 2nd career changes

• Impact of Social Forces• Direct and indirect impacts

– Urbanization

• Canadian urbanized areas account for about 85% of the population

• Associations are important - higher education, higher incomes, changes in family structure, access, and so on

• Increasing as these areas are ‘magnets’ for in migration populations

• Impact of Social Forces• Direct and indirect impacts

  Disposable Income  (1997 $)

  1989 - $18,639 (after tax, per capita)

  1998 - $17,679 (after tax, per capita)

Introduction to PopulationDefinitions

  SIZE OF THE POPULATION

• Differing and sometimes contradictory impacts

• One way is to look at the problems of pressures on facilities - the question of carrying capacitycarrying capacity

Carrying CapacityExample of a ski resort

  physical capacity - ski lift capacity, amount of rental equipment

2 ancillary capacity - road network, outside accommodations, restaurants

3 environmental capacity - ability of the physical environment to withstand pressure or to rebound from pressure

PiperoglouCarrying Capacity

• Carrying Capacity is the threshold of tourist activity beyond which

1 facilities are saturated - physical capacityphysical capacity2 environment is degraded - environmental environmental

capacitycapacity3 visitor enjoyment is reduced - perceptual perceptual

or psychological capacityor psychological capacity

• Establishment of levels - difficult task

• In a park - concern about

• quantity of resources

• tolerance of resources to use

• design and management of visitor facilities

• attitude and behaviour of visitors and managers

• Carrying capacity will be discussed in detail in the impacts section of the course

• have to consider means of protection from abuse and problems with flow and efficiency

• In addition - concern for population as a stimulus to development (complexity and variety) within the recreational system

Threshold Populations

• Facility development, and activities, programmes and services are associated with the concept of threshold populations

• Minimum number of people that are needed to economically justify a facility,

programme or service

Public Facilities

• No tendency to follow general patterns based on the size of the population

• irregular distribution and great variance with local and regional differences

• Governments are involved with acquisition and development of programs - the provision of facility development

Public Facilities

• Add to the planning by government objectives– establishment of external requirements– perceived needs of residents– local lobbying (pork barrel)

• End result with grants, subsidies– Pattern that cannot be explained by the Pattern that cannot be explained by the

operation of the marketoperation of the market

Private System

• Greater conformity to the size and distribution of population (market)

• A threshold population is only part of the larger population

– a split will give various users and non-users

• Some facilities can survive with a small population (Lotto centre)– expectation of high frequency within an area

• Large centres (arenas, movieplexes) need a larger support population– expectation of low frequency– distance becomes a factor

Example

• Winchester (USA)- division of Olin Mfg - has a division to handle franchising of shooting ranges

• Studies showed that they needed a base population of 500,000 within a days drive

• Now have 21 of these facilities

USA - Base Populations90’s

Function Area (Sq. Mi.) PopulationFast Food, Bar 2 3,000Tavern 4 10,000Bowling Cntr 8 20,000Campground 19 50,000Ice Rink orRacquet

77 200,000

Theme Park 1,158 3,000,000

Next Week

• Implications

• Why is the real life pattern different than the theoretical pattern?