tag:theconversation.com,2011:/uk/topics/recreation-6398/articlesRecreation – The Conversation2024-01-19T13:40:44Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2207712024-01-19T13:40:44Z2024-01-19T13:40:44ZOld forests are critically important for slowing climate change and merit immediate protection from logging<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570228/original/file-20240118-23-ojgpd7.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=6%2C13%2C2323%2C1893&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">An old-growth forest of noble fir trees at Marys Peak in Oregon's Coast Range.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Beverly Law</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Forests are an essential part of Earth’s operating system. They reduce the buildup of heat-trapping carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from fossil fuel combustion, deforestation and land degradation <a href="https://essd.copernicus.org/articles/15/5301/2023">by 30% each year</a>. This slows global temperature increases and the <a href="https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-4811-2022">resulting changes to the climate</a>. In the U.S., forests take up <a href="https://www.epa.gov/system/files/documents/2023-04/US-GHG-Inventory-2023-Main-Text.pdf">12% of the nation’s greenhouse gas emissions annually</a> and store the carbon long term in trees and soils.</p>
<p>Mature and old-growth forests, with larger trees than younger forests, play an outsized role in accumulating carbon and <a href="https://www.fs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/mature-and-old-growth-forests-tech.pdf">keeping it out of the atmosphere</a>. These forests are especially <a href="https://www.fs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/mature-and-old-growth-forests-tech.pdf">resistant to wildfires and other natural disturbances</a> as the climate warms.</p>
<p>Most forests in the continental U.S. have been harvested multiple times. Today, just 3.9% of timberlands across the U.S., in public and private hands, <a href="https://doi.org/10.2737/WO-GTR-97">are over 100 years old</a>, and most of these areas hold relatively little carbon compared with their potential. </p>
<p>The Biden administration is moving to <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2022/04/27/2022-09138/strengthening-the-nations-forests-communities-and-local-economies">improve protection for old-growth and mature forests</a> on federal land, which we see as a welcome step. But this involves regulatory changes that will likely take several years to complete. Meanwhile, existing forest management plans that allow logging of these important old, large trees remain in place.</p>
<p>As scientists who have spent decades studying <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=J2KWqAoAAAAJ&hl=en">forest ecosystems</a> and <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/William-Moomaw">the effects of climate change</a>, we believe that it is essential to start protecting carbon storage in these forests. In our view, there is ample scientific evidence to justify an immediate moratorium on logging mature and old-growth forests on federal lands. </p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ZdEIqV5QswE?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Remote sensing data from space is a new tool for estimating forest growth and density.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Federal action to protect mature and old-growth forests</h2>
<p>A week after his inauguration in 2021, President Joe Biden issued an executive order that set a goal of <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2021/01/27/executive-order-on-tackling-the-climate-crisis-at-home-and-abroad/">conserving at least 30%</a> of U.S. lands and waters by 2030 to address what the order called “a profound climate crisis.” In 2022, Biden recognized the climate importance of mature and old-growth forests for a healthy climate and <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2022/04/27/2022-09138/strengthening-the-nations-forests-communities-and-local-economies">called for conserving them</a> on federal lands.</p>
<p>Most recently, in December 2023, the U.S. Forest Service announced that it was <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2023/12/20/2023-27875/land-management-plan-direction-for-old-growth-forest-conditions-across-the-national-forest-system">evaluating the effects</a> of amending management plans for 128 U.S. national forests to better protect mature and old-growth stands – the first time any administration has taken this kind of action. </p>
<p>These actions seek to make existing old-growth forests more resilient; preserve ecological benefits that they provide, such as habitat for threatened and endangered species; establish new areas where <a href="https://www.fs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/mature-and-old-growth-forests-tech.pdf">old-growth conditions</a> can develop; and monitor the forests’ condition over time. The amended national forest management plans also would prohibit logging old-growth trees for mainly economic purposes – that is, producing timber. Harvesting trees would be permitted for other reasons, such as thinning to reduce fire severity in hot, dry regions where fires occur more frequently. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570231/original/file-20240118-24-xa1x8n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A woman rests her hand on the trunk of an enormous tree, looking up toward its crown." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570231/original/file-20240118-24-xa1x8n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/570231/original/file-20240118-24-xa1x8n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570231/original/file-20240118-24-xa1x8n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570231/original/file-20240118-24-xa1x8n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570231/original/file-20240118-24-xa1x8n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570231/original/file-20240118-24-xa1x8n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/570231/original/file-20240118-24-xa1x8n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Forest biologist Beverly Law with an old-growth Douglas fir in Corvallis, Oregon.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Beverly Law</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Remarkably, however, logging is hardly considered in the Forest Service’s <a href="https://www.fs.usda.gov/sites/default/files/mature-and-old-growth-forests-tech.pdf">initial analysis</a>, although studies show that it causes greater carbon losses than wildfires and pest infestations. </p>
<p>In one analysis across 11 western U.S. states, researchers calculated total aboveground tree carbon loss from logging, beetle infestations and fire between 2003 and 2012 and found that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-021-00326-0">logging accounted for half of it</a>. Across the states of California, Oregon and Washington, harvest-related carbon emissions between 2001 and 2016 averaged <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab28bb">five times the emissions</a> from wildfires.</p>
<p>A 2016 study found that nationwide, between 2006 and 2010, total carbon emissions from logging were <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/s13021-016-0066-5">comparable to emissions from all U.S. coal plants</a>, or to direct emissions from the entire building sector. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/569933/original/file-20240117-19-wsd8su.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Close-up of a furry animal with small rounded ears" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/569933/original/file-20240117-19-wsd8su.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/569933/original/file-20240117-19-wsd8su.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=575&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/569933/original/file-20240117-19-wsd8su.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=575&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/569933/original/file-20240117-19-wsd8su.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=575&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/569933/original/file-20240117-19-wsd8su.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=723&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/569933/original/file-20240117-19-wsd8su.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=723&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/569933/original/file-20240117-19-wsd8su.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=723&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Pacific fishers (<em>Pekania pennanti</em>) are small carnivores related to minks and otters. They live in forests with large, mixed-tree canopy covers, mainly on federal land on the West Coast. A subpopulation in the southern Sierra Nevada is listed as endangered.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/9PufBo">Pacific Southwest Forest Service, USDA/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Logging pressure</h2>
<p>Federal lands are used for multiple purposes, including biodiversity and water quality protection, recreation, mining, grazing and timber production. Sometimes, these uses can conflict with one another – for example, <a href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R43429">conservation and logging.</a>.</p>
<p>Legal mandates to manage land for multiple uses do not explicitly consider climate change, and federal agencies <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.3286">have not consistently factored climate change science</a> into their plans. Early in 2023, however, the White House <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/ceq/">Council on Environmental Quality</a> directed federal agencies to consider the effects of climate change when they <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2023/01/09/2023-00158/national-environmental-policy-act-guidance-on-consideration-of-greenhouse-gas-emissions-and-climate">propose major federal actions</a> that significantly affect the environment. </p>
<p>Multiple large logging projects on public land clearly qualify as major federal actions, but many thousands of acres have been <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/36/220.6">legally exempted</a> from such analysis. </p>
<p>Across the western U.S., <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-021-00326-0">just 20% of relatively high-carbon forests</a>, mostly on federal lands, are protected from logging and mining. A study in the lower 48 states found that 76% of mature and old-growth forests on federal lands <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/ffgc.2022.979528">are vulnerable to logging</a>. Harvesting these forests would release about <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/land11050721">half of their aboveground tree carbon</a> into the atmosphere within one or two decades. </p>
<p>An analysis of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1029/2023AV000965">152 national forests</a> across North America found that five forests in the Pacific Northwest had the highest carbon densities, but just 10% to 20% of these lands were protected at the highest levels. The majority of national forest area that is mature and old growth is not protected from logging, and <a href="https://www.climate-forests.org/worth-more-standing">current management plans</a> include logging of some of the largest trees still standing. </p>
<h2>Letting old trees grow</h2>
<p>Conserving forests is one of the most effective and lowest-cost options for managing atmospheric carbon dioxide, and mature and old-growth forests do this job most effectively. Protecting and expanding them does not require expensive or complex energy-consuming technologies, unlike some other <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-the-oil-industrys-pivot-to-carbon-capture-and-storage-while-it-keeps-on-drilling-isnt-a-climate-change-solution-171791">proposed climate solutions</a>.</p>
<p>Allowing mature and old-growth forests to <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/ffgc.2019.00027">continue growing</a> will remove from the air and store the largest amount of atmospheric carbon in the critical decades ahead. The sooner logging of these forests ceases, the more climate protection they can provide.</p>
<p><em><a href="https://www.woodwellclimate.org/staff/richard-birdsey/">Richard Birdsey</a>, a former U.S. Forest Service carbon and climate scientist and current senior scientist at the Woodwell Climate Research Center, contributed to this article.</em></p>
<p><em>This is an update of <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-biden-administration-has-called-for-protecting-mature-us-forests-to-slow-climate-change-but-its-still-allowing-them-to-be-logged-199845">an article</a> originally published on March 2, 2023.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/220771/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Beverly Law receives funding from the Conservation Biology Institute. </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>William Moomaw receives funding from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund.
</span></em></p>President Biden has called for protecting large, old trees from logging, but many of them could be cut while the regulatory process grinds forward.Beverly Law, Professor Emeritus of Global Change Biology and Terrestrial Systems Science, Oregon State UniversityWilliam Moomaw, Professor Emeritus of International Environmental Policy, Tufts UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2166002023-11-06T13:32:45Z2023-11-06T13:32:45ZSearching for the right angle – students in this course shoot pool to learn about journalism<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/556397/original/file-20231028-19-njpcze.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=42%2C17%2C5648%2C3771&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A journalism course invites students to consider the parallels between gathering news and shooting pool.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/confident-teenage-boys-playing-pool-on-illuminated-royalty-free-image/991158980?phrase=shooting+pool&adppopup=true">Maskot / Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="Text saying: Uncommon Courses, from The Conversation" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=375&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/499014/original/file-20221205-17-kcwec8.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=471&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<p><em><a href="https://theconversation.com/topics/uncommon-courses-130908">Uncommon Courses</a> is an occasional series from The Conversation U.S. highlighting unconventional approaches to teaching.</em> </p>
<h2>Title of course:</h2>
<p>“News Writing and Reporting II: Multimedia”</p>
<h2>What prompted the idea to use pool to teach journalism?</h2>
<p>I wanted to break up the monotony of having students sit at their computers and write news stories or listen to me lecture. So I figured I’d change the venue and try something more kinetic.</p>
<p>I had been going to the <a href="https://stamp.umd.edu/centers/terpzone">TerpZone</a> – a recreational area located in the basement of the student union at the University of Maryland in College Park, where I teach – to eat and use the Wi-Fi. As I watched students shoot pool, I thought: It would be cool to hold at least one class meeting here.</p>
<p>I also thought it would be beneficial. My rationale was that I knew there were some interesting parallels between shooting pool and news gathering. For instance, accurately reporting a complex story could be compared to making a tough shot.</p>
<p>Interestingly, the day I decided to convene class at the pool tables, our regular classroom was unavailable anyway due to a <a href="https://www.dcnewsnow.com/news/university-of-maryland-water-outage-after-water-main-break-some-buildings-closed/">water main break on campus</a>. So holding class at the pool tables in the TerpZone – which was not affected – ended up being quite fortuitous.</p>
<h2>What materials did the lesson require?</h2>
<p>I rented four pool tables for an hour or so. I have 14 students. Some students competed on two-player teams, so there would be up to four students per table. </p>
<p>We got the tables at half price, so it cost me $16.</p>
<p>For students who weren’t familiar with pool, I provided a link to a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lmfKI01S-ws">short instructional video</a> to watch before class. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/BCvna-0tTpY?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">“The Importance Of Angles In Pool”</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What does the pool lesson explore?</h2>
<p>We explored the various ways that good journalism is like shooting pool. To do this, I had each student interview three classmates and ask each one for a journalism/pool analogy. The idea was to have students collect a variety of viewpoints, just as if they were out covering a story in the community, which they do often for this course. </p>
<h2>What’s a critical lesson from the pool lesson?</h2>
<p>Students reported that shooting pool gave them a visual way to understand what journalists do. </p>
<p>One student found it helpful for players to “step back and take a new look at the table before their turn” – a concept that easily applies to reporting a story.</p>
<p>“Finding the right angle for an article requires taking a fresh look at the facts and quotes,” the student wrote.</p>
<p>Another student said both journalism and shooting pool require patience. A different student touched on the benefits of remaining calm – whether as a journalist on deadline or when it’s time to sink the eight ball to win the game.</p>
<p>“Composure is key when it comes to both,” the student said. “I think there are high-pressure moments. Now you have one ball left, two balls left, and you gotta be able to keep your composure, perform under pressure.”</p>
<p>Other students noted how pool demonstrates the need to anticipate unforeseen consequences as they pursue stories.</p>
<p>“It was important to know where all the balls were on the table and how hitting one would affect the others,” the student said. </p>
<h2>Why is this approach relevant now?</h2>
<p>Americans’ trust in the media to report the news accurately and fairly is <a href="https://news.gallup.com/poll/403166/americans-trust-media-remains-near-record-low.aspx">at a near record low</a> – just 34%. </p>
<p>If pool – or any other game – can teach future journalists to be more thoughtful about how they pursue stories, perhaps it can lead to better coverage and help restore public confidence in what the media report.</p>
<p>There are other reasons why an approach like this makes sense at this particular time. Students are under a lot of <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2022.886344">academic stress</a>, which can affect their overall well-being. As many pool players will tell you, shooting pool can be a <a href="https://www.thecaregiverspace.org/billiards-to-cope-with-stress/">positive way to relieve stress</a>. It also can help <a href="https://www.dovemed.com/healthy-living/wellness-center/health-benefits-billiards/">build self-esteem and improve concentration</a>.</p>
<p>Also, before we shot pool together, I rarely saw students socialize with one another so effortlessly. When we moved class to the pool hall, students socialized like never before. So it was a good team-building exercise. My only regret was not doing it sooner in the semester.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/216600/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jamaal Abdul-Alim works as an adjunct at the University of Maryland in College Park. He also currently serves as education editor at The Conversation.</span></em></p>A journalism professor discovers that some of the best lessons for future journalists can be taught on a pool table.Jamaal Abdul-Alim, Lecturer in Journalism, University of MarylandLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2042392023-05-11T17:06:56Z2023-05-11T17:06:56ZFor postpartum moms, playing team sports boosted well-being and helped manage unrealistic expectations of motherhood<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525485/original/file-20230510-29-qear2z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=103%2C192%2C4573%2C3096&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Team sport is an important activity to explore because it provides opportunities to build community, enhance health and well-being, and counter the often unrealistic and self-sacrificing expectations of motherhood.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><iframe style="width: 100%; height: 100px; border: none; position: relative; z-index: 1;" allowtransparency="" allow="clipboard-read; clipboard-write" src="https://narrations.ad-auris.com/widget/the-conversation-canada/for-postpartum-moms--playing-team-sports-boosted-well-being-and-helped-manage-unrealistic-expectations-of-motherhood" width="100%" height="400"></iframe>
<p>There are success stories of mothers being physically active after childbirth — particularly in <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/14927713.2023.2187867">individual activities</a> such as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00222216.2020.1864238">yoga</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/13573322.2021.1942821">running</a>, walking and other exercise. But what can be done to help postpartum moms participate in team sport?</p>
<p>Team sport is an important activity to explore because it provides opportunities to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1123/wspaj.2014-0010">build community, enhance health and well-being</a>, and counter the often unrealistic and self-sacrificing expectations of motherhood. </p>
<p>These expectations can include dedicating all of one’s time, energy and resources to be considered a “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1751-9020.2007.00076.x">good mother</a>” and <a href="https://doi.org/10.4324/9780429323300">managing a household</a> while sacrificing leisure and sport participation.</p>
<h2>Stories of pressures, resistance, support</h2>
<p>As researchers in leisure studies and sport management, we recently <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01490400.2023.2180118">published a study</a> in which we worked with postpartum mothers (six weeks to one year post-childbirth) who participated in team sport. </p>
<p>Because we chose a research design that uses storytelling, below we share some excerpts of the postpartum mothers’ stories that describe the successes and challenges they experienced in team sport.</p>
<h2>Michelle’s story of pressure</h2>
<blockquote>
<p>“Team sport helps me resist the pressures of motherhood more than any other sport. It’s something I do for myself, which is something you don’t have much of when you have kids. But there are also the pressures of motherhood. You want to give your kids everything, but you’re always questioning yourself. Am I giving enough time? Am I good enough? When can I take time for myself? Am I gonna impact the kids because I want time off? It’s never-ending, but it’s something you learn to live with. I always wonder if what I do is enough. I feel like a culprit if I take time off.” </p>
</blockquote>
<p>As Michelle’s story reveals, the women felt the tension of successful participation alongside maintaining the “good mother” ideal — and this tension was always present. </p>
<p>Some participants told us stories of all the mental and physical work they had to do before they could participate in team sport. These included arranging childcare, making family dinners before they left, not leaving home until after the child(ren) were in bed. Feelings of guilt, social expectations to be “perfect mothers” and self-doubt remained present, especially before leaving to play.</p>
<h2>Jennifer’s story of resistance</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Photo looking up at a huddle of three female hockey players in helmets and gear, and their female coach" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525242/original/file-20230509-45890-mqcefr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525242/original/file-20230509-45890-mqcefr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525242/original/file-20230509-45890-mqcefr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525242/original/file-20230509-45890-mqcefr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525242/original/file-20230509-45890-mqcefr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525242/original/file-20230509-45890-mqcefr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525242/original/file-20230509-45890-mqcefr.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Taking time for self-care through sport was an act of resistance against the expectation of being the ‘perfect mother.’</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<blockquote>
<p>“Coming back to hockey made me feel really empowered. I was getting a lot of kudos from the other moms being like ‘We can’t believe you’re back so early!’ Just being on a team full of moms is empowering. I also felt proud for coming back, and terribly out of shape. The most out of shape I have ever been in my life… But I was proud of myself for taking time for myself. I usually stay in the dressing room for a little bit longer than normal after games. I would be the last or second to last person in there because I was literally cherishing those two-and-a-half to three hours out of the house.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Mothers’ participation in team sport often involved navigating challenges, such as lack of time, childcare and breastfeeding. </p>
<p>But the mothers shared stories of how much they valued team sport. Taking time for <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/11745398.2019.1652661">self-care</a> through sport was an act of resistance against the expectation of being the “perfect mother.” The postpartum mothers also felt empowered as they resisted this expectation, which helped them feel more confident as women, athletes and mothers.</p>
<h2>Celia’s story of support</h2>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Two women playing doubles tennis" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525486/original/file-20230510-16171-g46cen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/525486/original/file-20230510-16171-g46cen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525486/original/file-20230510-16171-g46cen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525486/original/file-20230510-16171-g46cen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525486/original/file-20230510-16171-g46cen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525486/original/file-20230510-16171-g46cen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/525486/original/file-20230510-16171-g46cen.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Teammates fostered a sense of community and support that encouraged players’ participation.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<blockquote>
<p>“While I was off, I was really looking forward to going back to sport, because I’m not someone who likes to go to the gym or do home body-weight exercises. When I went back to tennis, we made sure we had one extra player come along to always have an extra person to watch our babies. They all know that we have kids. People share the duty to sit on the bench and just move the stroller so they can continue sleeping. I was also cautious to have one more player for my return to volleyball to look after my baby. </p>
<p>The other day our fifth player was late. We played and (my baby) was mostly asleep during the first set, so I didn’t have to make any sacrifices because sport is important for our mental and physical health.”</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Women in our study shared stories about the importance of support. Partners, family and friends provided important support to look after the baby. </p>
<p>Similar to the findings of <a href="https://theconversation.com/helping-new-moms-return-to-exercise-and-leisure-supports-their-physical-and-mental-health-182024">previous research</a>, these support networks were also essential in providing the postpartum mothers with emotional support and encouragement for their team sport participation.</p>
<p>Importantly, teammates also fostered a sense of community and support that encouraged players’ participation. They encouraged mothers to return to sport post-childbirth, maintained relationships with participants while on leave, and helped care for their babies on the sidelines.</p>
<p>The return to team sport is a messy process marked with feelings of resistance, empowerment, community and tension.</p>
<p>This research emphasizes the need for increased support for postpartum women to return to sport that is meaningful and empowering. Yet, it also shows the importance of changing the social expectations of self-sacrificing motherhood that challenges their well-being during a difficult life transition.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/204239/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Talia Ritondo received funding from her SSHRC master's scholarship and the Ontario Government Scholarship.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Dawn Trussell receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada as well as Sport Canada. </span></em></p>Team sport provides postpartum mothers with opportunities to build community, enhance health and well-being, and counter the often unrealistic and self-sacrificing expectations of motherhood.Talia Ritondo, PhD Candidate, School of Human Kinetics, L’Université d’Ottawa/University of OttawaDawn Trussell, Associate Professor of Sport Management & Chancellor's Chair for Research Excellence, Brock UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1998452023-03-09T13:40:14Z2023-03-09T13:40:14ZThe Biden administration has called for protecting mature US forests to slow climate change, but it’s still allowing them to be logged<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514058/original/file-20230307-20-4x3z0m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=20%2C15%2C3438%2C2286&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">An old-growth tree that was cut in Alaska's Tongass National Forest. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/an-old-growth-tree-that-was-cut-is-seen-in-the-tongass-news-photo/1241027768">Salwan Georges/The Washington Post via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Forests are critically important for slowing climate change. They remove huge quantities of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere – <a href="https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-14-4811-2022">30% of all fossil fuel emissions annually</a> – and store carbon in trees and soils. Old and mature forests are especially important: They handle droughts, storms and wildfires better than young trees, and they store more carbon.</p>
<p>In a 2022 executive order, President Joe Biden called for <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2022/04/27/2022-09138/strengthening-the-nations-forests-communities-and-local-economies">conserving mature and old-growth forests</a> on federal lands. Recently Biden <a href="https://theconversation.com/biden-restores-roadless-protection-to-the-tongass-north-americas-largest-rainforest-164680">protected nearly half</a> of the Tongass National Forest in Alaska from road-building and logging. </p>
<p>The Biden administration is compiling an inventory of mature and old-growth forests on public lands that will support further conservation actions. But at the same time, federal agencies are initiating and implementing numerous <a href="https://www.climate-forests.org/_files/ugd/ae2fdb_b5a2315e3e8b42498b4c269730c3955a.pdf">logging projects</a> in mature and old forests without accounting for how these projects will affect climate change or forest species. </p>
<p>As scientists who have spent decades studying <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=J2KWqAoAAAAJ&hl=en">forest ecosystems</a> and <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/William-Moomaw">climate change impacts</a>, we find that to effectively slow climate change, it is essential to increase carbon storage in these forests, not reduce it. A first step toward this goal would be to halt logging federal forests with relatively <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-021-00326-0">high-biomass carbon per acre</a> until the Biden administration develops a plan for conserving them. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1632094558308962304"}"></div></p>
<h2>Balancing timber and climate change</h2>
<p>Many of the <a href="https://sgp.fas.org/crs/misc/R42346.pdf">640 million acres</a> that the federal government owns and manages are used for multiple purposes, including protecting biodiversity and water quality, recreation, mining, grazing and logging. Sometimes these uses conflict with one another. </p>
<p>Legal mandates to manage land for multiple uses do not explicitly mention climate change, and federal agencies <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.3286">have not consistently factored climate change science</a> into their plans. However, at the beginning of 2023, the White House <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/ceq/">Council on Environmental Quality</a> directed federal agencies to consider the effects of climate change when they <a href="https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2023/01/09/2023-00158/national-environmental-policy-act-guidance-on-consideration-of-greenhouse-gas-emissions-and-climate">propose major federal actions</a> that significantly affect the environment. </p>
<p>Some logging projects fall into this category. But many large logging projects that affect thousands of acres have been <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/cfr/text/36/220.6">legally exempted</a> from such analysis.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514055/original/file-20230307-2080-gczo6j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Steep hills studded with evergreen trees and laced with narrow roads." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514055/original/file-20230307-2080-gczo6j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514055/original/file-20230307-2080-gczo6j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514055/original/file-20230307-2080-gczo6j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514055/original/file-20230307-2080-gczo6j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514055/original/file-20230307-2080-gczo6j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514055/original/file-20230307-2080-gczo6j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514055/original/file-20230307-2080-gczo6j.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Logging roads crisscross steep logged slopes in Idaho’s Clearwater National Forest in 2019.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/logging-roads-remaining-after-a-timber-sale-crisscross-news-photo/1189427245">Don & Melinda Crawford/Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What’s lost when old trees are cut</h2>
<p>Most forests in the continental U.S. have been harvested multiple times. Today, fewer than 5% of these forests <a href="https://doi.org/10.2737/WO-GTR-97">are more than 100 years old</a>. Old, very large trees are the ones that hold the most carbon, and harvesting forests is the main driver of forest carbon loss. </p>
<p>For example, in Oregon’s national forests east of the Cascades crest, a 1990s policy formerly spared trees larger than 21 inches in diameter – but the rule was rolled back in 2021 so that large trees could be cut. A recent analysis found that these larger trees comprised just 3% of all trees in the six national forests, but <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/ffgc.2020.594274">accounted for 42% of living tree carbon</a>. </p>
<p>In the Green Mountain National Forest in Vermont, federal officials have approved 40,000 acres of harvest since 2016, targeting many mature and old trees. One 14,270-acre area that was approved for harvest in 2019 contained <a href="https://www.climate-forests.org/_files/ugd/ae2fdb_b5a2315e3e8b42498b4c269730c3955a.pdf">more than 130 stands older than 100 years</a>. This project required the construction of 25 miles of logging roads, which <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s40725-016-0044-x">can have harmful effects</a>, including fragmenting forests, polluting streams and making forests more vulnerable to human-caused wildfires. </p>
<p>Canada is also allowing large, mature trees to be harvested. In British Columbia, mature forests that include old-growth trees historically absorbed more carbon than they released to the atmosphere, resulting in a net carbon sink annually. But since 2002, these tracts have emitted more carbon than they removed from the atmosphere, primarily because of logging, beetle attacks and wildfires. According to British Columbia’s greenhouse gas emissions inventory, these forests now <a href="https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/environment/climate-change/data/provincial-inventory">emit more carbon than the province’s energy sector</a>. </p>
<p>In eastern Canada, the Pacific Northwest and the southeastern U.S., timber companies have removed many old trees and replaced them with plantations that contain just one or two tree species. This shift has reduced the structural diversity of the <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/agricultural-and-biological-sciences/forest-canopy">forest canopy</a> – the ecologically important layer formed by the crowns of trees – and the diversity of tree species. Losing old-forest habitat has also caused broad-scale <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-022-01737-8">population declines</a> among many forest bird species in eastern Canada, and is likely having the same effect in the U.S.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/dLOG5jzvnow?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">This National Park Service video explains how a second-growth forest – one that has grown back after being logged – is less diverse and healthy than an old, mature forest.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>More harvesting releases more carbon</h2>
<p>One argument forest product companies make to support logging is that wood can be regrown, and it <a href="https://bellwetherfp.com/lets-get-some-things-straight-about-logging-and-the-environment/#">releases less carbon dioxide to the atmosphere</a> than other building materials. Such claims often make optimistic assumptions that overstate the carbon benefits of harvesting trees by <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab1e95">factors of 2 to 100</a>. </p>
<p>Some studies indicate that <a href="https://www.fs.usda.gov/features/thinning-forest-trees">thinning forests</a> by harvesting some trees and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/fee.1791">reintroducing low-intensity fires</a> can reduce the intensity of future wildfires, leaving more carbon stored in trees. But these studies don’t account for the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1186/s13021-016-0066-5">large amount of carbon</a> that is released to the atmosphere after trees are cut.</p>
<p>In a review published in 2019, we worked with colleagues to estimate how much carbon was contained in trees that were harvested in Washington, Oregon and California from 1900 through 2015, and what happened to it after the trees were logged. We calculated that just 19% of the harvested carbon was in long-lived wood products like timber in buildings. Another 16% was in landfills, and the remaining 65% was <a href="https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab28bb">released into the atmosphere</a> as carbon dioxide.</p>
<p>In contrast, in 2011 the Australian state of Tasmania <a href="https://www.dcceew.gov.au/climate-change/publications/state-and-territory-greenhouse-gas-inventories">suspended logging on half of its old-growth forest area</a>. Within less than a decade, Tasmania was <a href="https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ac661b">storing more carbon than it released</a> because it was avoiding harvest emissions and the mature trees it saved were accumulating so much carbon.</p>
<p>In the U.S. Pacific Northwest, implementation of the 1994 <a href="https://www.fs.usda.gov/r6/reo/overview.php#">Northwest Forest Plan</a>, which the Clinton administration developed to protect endangered species in old-growth forests on public lands, significantly <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foreco.2014.11.023">increased carbon storage</a> over the next 17 years. In contrast, privately managed lands in the region accumulated virtually no additional carbon after accounting for losses from wildfire and harvesting.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514062/original/file-20230307-2223-vtcifz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Truck loaded with massive logs." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514062/original/file-20230307-2223-vtcifz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/514062/original/file-20230307-2223-vtcifz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514062/original/file-20230307-2223-vtcifz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514062/original/file-20230307-2223-vtcifz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=390&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514062/original/file-20230307-2223-vtcifz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=490&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514062/original/file-20230307-2223-vtcifz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=490&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/514062/original/file-20230307-2223-vtcifz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=490&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A logging truck in the Pacific Northwest in 1954. Since 1600, 90% of the original forests in what is now the U.S. have been logged.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/lumber-truck-pacific-northwest-usa-1950-news-photo/629442731">Universal History Archive via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The cheapest and simplest way to capture carbon</h2>
<p>President Biden has set a goal of reducing U.S. greenhouse gas emissions to <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/US-Long-Term-Strategy.pdf">net-zero by 2050</a> to avoid catastrophic climate change. To reach that goal, U.S. forests, lands and oceans will have to remove as much carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as the nation emits from fossil fuels, industry and agriculture. </p>
<p>In the western U.S., our research shows that protecting half of the mature carbon-dense forests in zones that are relatively less vulnerable to drought and fire could <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-021-00326-0">triple carbon stocks and accumulation</a> on protected forests by 2050. A majority of these forests are on public lands.</p>
<p>The carbon dioxide that human activities are releasing into the atmosphere today will elevate global temperatures and raise sea levels <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.0812721106">for 1,000 years or more</a>, unless societies can find ways to remove it. In its 2022 climate assessment report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded that protecting existing natural forests was “<a href="https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg2/downloads/report/IPCC_AR6_WGII_Chapter02.pdf">the highest priority for reducing greenhouse gas emissions</a>.” </p>
<p>Conserving forests is one of the lowest-cost options for managing carbon dioxide emissions, and it doesn’t require <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-the-oil-industrys-pivot-to-carbon-capture-and-storage-while-it-keeps-on-drilling-isnt-a-climate-change-solution-171791">expensive or complex energy-consuming technologies</a>. In our view, sufficient science exists to justify a moratorium on harvesting mature trees on federal lands so that these forests can keep performing their invaluable work.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/199845/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>William Moomaw receives funding from the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. He is affiliated with the Woodwell Climate Research Center and the Union of Concerned Scientists. Moomaw has been a lead author of five major Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Beverly Law does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Protecting old and mature trees is the simplest and least expensive way to pull carbon out of the atmosphere – but proposed logging projects threaten mature stands across the US.Beverly Law, Professor Emeritus of Global Change Biology and Terrestrial Systems Science, Oregon State UniversityWilliam Moomaw, Professor Emeritus of International Environmental Policy, Tufts UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1935602023-02-10T12:29:00Z2023-02-10T12:29:00ZParks versus people? Challenges facing the South African capital’s greening efforts<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/496238/original/file-20221119-16195-ziab04.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=8%2C5%2C1839%2C1349&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Green spaces provide benefits for people and nature. Photo by Ida Breed,</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">GRIP Research team</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Urban green spaces have recently been getting more research attention because of the <a href="https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/978-1-80043-636-720211018/full/html">benefits</a> they offer. </p>
<p>Gardens, parks, reserves and trees have been <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/12/17/6836">linked</a> to cultural, spiritual and alternative medical solutions. Natural or semi-natural land areas can also deliver ecosystem services like <a href="https://theconversation.com/growing-plants-on-buildings-can-reduce-heat-and-produce-healthy-food-in-african-cities-191190">food</a>, storm water management and <a href="https://theconversation.com/heat-and-health-dar-es-salaams-informal-settlements-need-help-181816">climate control</a>. Cities can <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0169204619303299">plan and manage</a> these for maximum benefit. </p>
<p>Our research team works on the <a href="https://bio.au.dk/forskning/forskningscentre/biochange/research/grip">Integrative Green Infrastructure Planning</a> project, a collaboration between the University of Pretoria in South Africa and Aarhus University in Denmark. We reviewed policy documents relating to green infrastructure in the City of Tshwane (Pretoria and surrounds) to look for ways to plan, manage and maintain these green space resources. We also interviewed city officials and held workshops with officials and consultants. </p>
<p>We discovered that Tshwane needs guidelines based on green infrastructure principles. An increase in green infrastructure awareness among city officials and residents will increase the many benefits that green spaces can deliver. </p>
<h2>Rapid development</h2>
<p>Tshwane is in an area that is rich in biodiversity. It is one of the largest metropolitan <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0169204614000401?casa_token=Q5h4MFqVI0QAAAAA:-ODIuvQ82fal3HOrbipS9bvrqRGs_XwYYPr4cPCK303KBF_sF8KJ1Y5KSqMrWE_r_7nrg5PX">municipalities</a> by area in the world – growing at <a href="https://www.statssa.gov.za/?page_id=1021&id=city-of-tshwane-municipality">3.1%</a> a year – and serves as the administrative seat of South Africa’s government. Despite the change of government to democratic rule in 1994, the impact of the apartheid era still shows in the city’s neighbourhoods and land development. People are still separated spatially and some areas have more services, facilities and access to planned green infrastructure than others.</p>
<p>Green infrastructure in Tshwane takes the form of public and private gardens, street trees, community parks, unmanaged vegetated land and reserves. The City of <a href="https://cer.org.za/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/CityofTshwane_Final_March-2016.pdf">Tshwane bioregional plan 2016</a> revealed that its biodiverse, protected and ecological areas covered 456,340 hectares – 26% of Tshwane’s land.</p>
<p>In any city, expansion often comes at the expense of green spaces. In Tshwane, our research found that the challenges to green infrastructure include rapid development, budget constraints, departmental silos, negative perceptions and limited capacity within departments. Collaboration is also insufficient among different disciplines in the city’s departments to manage and sustain green infrastructure.</p>
<p>One official told us: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>The biggest challenge towards green infrastructure sustainability has to do with rapid developments linked to aspects such as higher rates of formalising the informal settlements, which is difficult for planning to meet up with. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Another challenge is that of resources. A city official explained that projects like electricity provision and road construction were prioritised above the environment. In her words: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>If we look at the capital budget, the portion of the budget going into the environment is probably less than one percent. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>We found that the flow of information among departments was limited. One informant said the situation could complicate necessary or urgent decisions and actions. For example, solutions to flooding might need to go beyond the Infrastructure and Engineering department and include the Social and Human settlement department, to help with welfare and relocation. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>We don’t optimise the benefits of understanding the connections and linkages between different departments. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>Another city official argued that residents’ perceptions could make or mar green infrastructure planning:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>People just don’t comply with related green infrastructure by-laws because there’s not much ecological awareness. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>From our policy documents analysis, the research team discovered that housing, roads, electricity and water were at the top of the government priority list. Most of the yearly budget was directed towards these services. Plans for green infrastructure were mostly embedded in climate action plans.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/green-policies-are-in-place-for-south-africas-major-port-city-but-a-key-piece-is-missing-181272">Green policies are in place for South Africa's major port city: but a key piece is missing</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/496239/original/file-20221119-16-adim7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A small river surrounded by trees and vegetation." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/496239/original/file-20221119-16-adim7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/496239/original/file-20221119-16-adim7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/496239/original/file-20221119-16-adim7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/496239/original/file-20221119-16-adim7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=497&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/496239/original/file-20221119-16-adim7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=625&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/496239/original/file-20221119-16-adim7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=625&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/496239/original/file-20221119-16-adim7c.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=625&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Urban green spaces, like this stretch of river in Mabopane, have great potential for recreational activities, cultural uses and climate adaptation, Photo by: Maya Pasgaard.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">GRIP research team</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We believe there are opportunities for balancing the preservation of green spaces and the socio-economic needs of the people by creating multi-functional and beneficial green spaces. The city of Aarhus in Denmark is an example of a city where recently developed urban green spaces provide multi-functional benefits. For example, a new urban park also retains storm water during flooding events. </p>
<p><a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11625-020-00886-8">Transdisciplinarity</a> has lately been highlighted as a way to tackle complex global challenges. </p>
<p>City officials in Aarhus spoke of the way green infrastructure planning should cut across divisions like engineering and housing departments, and across disciplines.</p>
<p>One said:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I see a need for trans- and interdisciplinarity within departments; the issue of managing storm water should not only be from the engineering perspectives but from planning and social angle. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>One way to break down departmental silos could be to work together on joint projects. </p>
<h2>Balancing needs</h2>
<p>Cities need to balance residents’ daily needs with the conservation of green spaces for biodiversity, climate change adaptation and environmental health. </p>
<p>Based on the interviews, a way forward is for the city to engage in collaborative processes to create an enabling environment and develop actionable guidelines for people and green spaces to co-exist. </p>
<p>In our research, we mapped out three priority green areas to support Tshwane’s biodiversity. </p>
<p>We recommend that the high priority green areas that produce most green infrastructure benefits should be judiciously conserved. The medium priority areas should serve as buffer zones to the critical biodiverse areas that are at risk of climate hazards, fires and the like. The low priority areas are those with low green infrastructure benefits, characterised by high population density and informal development. These areas are flexible for development.</p>
<p>Green infrastructure planning and management includes increasing awareness of the benefits of green space to government, developers and residents, creating a joint vision and making it clear what’s expected from everyone.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/193560/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Titilope Funmbi Onaolapo receives funding from Danish International Development Agency (DANIDA). Integrative Green Infrastructure Planning is a funded project by DANIDA, which is a collaboration between the University of Pretoria, South Africa and Aarhus University, Denmark. It is an interdisciplinary research project tied to a city to city, a Strategic Sector Cooperation (SSC) in Denmark.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christina Breed is affiliated with the University of Pretoria in South Africa and receives funding from the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kristine Engemann Jensen is affiliated with Aarhus University, Denmark and receives funding from the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Maya Pasgaard is affiliated with Aarhus University in Denmark and receives funding from the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. </span></em></p>South Africa needs to integrate urban green spaces as part of valuable infrastructure and provide framework for their sustainability.Titilope Funmbi Onaolapo, Postdoctoral fellow, University of PretoriaChristina Breed, Senior Lecturer, University of PretoriaKristine Engemann Jensen, Assistant Professor, Aarhus UniversityMaya Pasgaard, Adjunct assistant professor, Aarhus UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1973402023-02-06T13:27:56Z2023-02-06T13:27:56ZAs climate change and overuse shrink Lake Powell, the emergent landscape is coming back to life – and posing new challenges<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507729/original/file-20230201-11157-wkkhhg.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5939%2C3341&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The white 'bathtub ring' around Lake Powell, which is roughly 110 feet high, shows the former high water mark.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/DroughtLakePowell/5288ffa6ba2c44f38526491d1fde4b77/photo">AP Photo/Rick Bowmer</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>As Western states haggle over <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2023/jan/31/california-colorado-river-water-use-proposal">reducing water use</a> because of declining flows in the Colorado River Basin, a more hopeful drama is playing out in Glen Canyon. </p>
<p>Lake Powell, the second-largest U.S. reservoir, extends from northern Arizona into southern Utah. A critical water source for seven Colorado River Basin states, it has shrunk dramatically over the past 40 years. </p>
<p>An ongoing <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/02/14/1080302434/study-finds-western-megadrought-is-the-worst-in-1-200-years">22-year megadrought</a> has lowered the water level to just <a href="https://lakepowell.water-data.com/index2.php">22.6% of “full pool</a>,” and that trend is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-022-01290-z">expected to continue</a>. Federal officials assert that there are <a href="https://www.deseret.com/utah/2022/8/1/23186668/lake-powell-debate-drain-western-drought-hydropower-utah-arizona-colorado-river-lake-mead">no plans to drain Lake Powell</a>, but overuse and climate change are draining it anyway. </p>
<p>As the water drops, Glen Canyon – one of the most scenic areas in the U.S. West – is reappearing. </p>
<p>This landscape, which includes the Colorado River’s main channel and about 100 side canyons, was flooded starting in the mid-1960s with the completion of <a href="https://www.usbr.gov/uc/rm/crsp/gc/">Glen Canyon Dam</a> in northern Arizona. The area’s stunning beauty and unique features have led observers to call it “<a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/01/07/1067716380/western-megadrought-climate-lake-powell-glen-canyon-reservoir">America’s lost national park</a>.” </p>
<p>Lake Powell’s decline offers an unprecedented opportunity to recover the unique landscape at Glen Canyon. But managing this emergent landscape also presents serious political and environmental challenges. In my view, government agencies should start planning for them now. </p>
<p><iframe id="2SoM3" class="tc-infographic-datawrapper" src="https://datawrapper.dwcdn.net/2SoM3/5/" height="400px" width="100%" style="border: none" frameborder="0"></iframe></p>
<h2>A tarnished jewel</h2>
<p>Glen Canyon Dam, which towers 710 feet high, was designed to create a water “bank account” for the Colorado River Basin. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation touted Lake Powell as the “<a href="https://energyhistory.yale.edu/library-item/bureau-reclamation-lake-powell-jewel-colorado-1965">Jewel of the Colorado</a>” and promised that it would be a motorboater’s paradise and an endless source of water and hydropower. </p>
<p>Lake Powell was so big that it took 17 years to fill to capacity. At full pool, it contained <a href="https://www.arizona-leisure.com/lake-powell-facts.html">27 million acre-feet of water</a> – enough to cover 27 million acres of land to a depth of one foot – and Glen Canyon Dam’s turbines could generate 1,300 megawatts of power when the reservoir was high. </p>
<p>Soon the reservoir was drawing <a href="https://irma.nps.gov/STATS/SSRSReports/Park%20Specific%20Reports/Recreation%20Visitors%20By%20Month%20(1979%20-%20Last%20Calendar%20Year)?Park=GLCA">millions of boaters and water skiers</a> every year. But starting in the late 1980s, its volume declined sharply as states drew more water from the Colorado River while climate change-induced drought reduced the river’s flow. Today the reservoir’s average volume is <a href="https://lakepowell.water-data.com/index2.php">less than 6 million acre-feet</a>.</p>
<p>Nearly every boat ramp is closed, and many of them sit far from the retreating reservoir. Hydropower production may cease as early as 2024 if the lake falls to “<a href="https://new.azwater.gov/news/articles/2022-03-11">minimum power pool</a>,” the lowest point at which the turbines can draw water. And water supplies to 40 million people are gravely endangered under current management scenarios. </p>
<p>These water supply issues have created a serious crisis in the basin, but there is also an opportunity to recover an amazing landscape. Over 100,000 acres of formerly flooded land have emerged, including world-class scenery that rivals some of the crown jewels of the U.S. national park system. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/y7jm08U38c0?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">As Lake Powell recedes, it is uncovering formerly flooded land and things that past visitors left behind.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Bargained away</h2>
<p>Glen Canyon made a deep impression on explorer <a href="https://www.britannica.com/biography/John-Wesley-Powell">John Wesley Powell</a> when he surveyed the Colorado River starting in 1867. When Powell’s expedition <a href="https://geology.utah.gov/map-pub/survey-notes/powell-1869-river-journey/">floated through Glen Canyon in 1869</a>, he wrote: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>“On the walls, and back many miles into the country, numbers of monument-shaped buttes are observed. So we have a curious ensemble of wonderful features – carved walls, royal arches, glens, alcove gulches, mounds, and monuments … past these towering monuments, past these oak-set glens, past these fern-decked alcoves, past these mural curves, we glide hour after hour.” </p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507725/original/file-20230201-17231-cillry.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A red rock cliff towers above trees and a small pool of water." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507725/original/file-20230201-17231-cillry.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/507725/original/file-20230201-17231-cillry.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507725/original/file-20230201-17231-cillry.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507725/original/file-20230201-17231-cillry.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=463&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507725/original/file-20230201-17231-cillry.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=582&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507725/original/file-20230201-17231-cillry.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=582&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/507725/original/file-20230201-17231-cillry.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=582&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This side canyon emerged in recent years as Lake Powell shrank. The white ‘bathtub ring’ on the rock wall shows past water levels.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Daniel Craig McCool</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Glen Canyon remained relatively unknown until the late 1940s, when the Bureau of Reclamation <a href="https://coloradoencyclopedia.org/article/echo-park-dam-controversy">proposed several large dams</a> on the upper Colorado River for irrigation and hydropower. Environmentalists fiercely objected to one at Echo Park in <a href="https://www.nps.gov/dino/index.htm">Dinosaur National Monument</a> on the Colorado-Utah border, alarmed by the prospect of building a dam in a national monument. Their <a href="https://coloradoencyclopedia.org/article/echo-park-dam-controversy">campaign to block it</a> succeeded – but in return they accepted a dam in Glen Canyon, a decision that former Sierra Club President David Brower later called <a href="https://www.deseret.com/2000/3/15/19496225/glen-canyon-outrage-br-2-sides-air-views-on-2-sides-of-the-still-controversial-dam">his greatest regret</a>.</p>
<h2>New challenges</h2>
<p>The first goal of managing the emergent landscape in Glen Canyon should be the inclusion of tribes in a co-management role. The Colorado River and its tributaries are managed through a complex maze of laws, court cases and regulations known as the “<a href="https://www.crwua.org/law-of-the-river.html">Law of the River</a>.” In an act of stupendous injustice, the Law of the River ignored the water rights of Native Americans until <a href="https://theconversation.com/as-climate-change-parches-the-southwest-heres-a-better-way-to-share-water-from-the-shrinking-colorado-river-168723">courts stepped in</a> and required western water users to consider their rights. </p>
<p>Tribes received no water allocation in the 1922 <a href="https://www.usbr.gov/lc/region/pao/pdfiles/crcompct.pdf">Colorado River Compact</a> and were ignored or trivialized in subsequent legislation. Even though modern concepts of water management emphasize including all major stakeholders, tribes were excluded from the policymaking process. </p>
<p>There are 30 tribes in the Colorado River Basin, at least 19 of which have an association with Glen Canyon. They have rights to a substantial portion of the river’s flow, and there are thousands of <a href="https://www.sltrib.com/news/2022/10/24/cultural-sites-are-being/">Indigenous cultural sites in the canyon</a>. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/CdBMZPjrEhq/?utm_source=ig_web_copy_link","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<p>Another management challenge is the massive amounts of sediment that have accumulated in the canyon. “Colorado” means “colored red” in Spanish, a recognition of the silt-laden water. This silt used to build beaches in the Grand Canyon, just downstream, and created the Colorado River delta in Mexico. </p>
<p>But for the past 63 years, it has been accumulating in Lake Powell, where it now clogs some sections of the main channel and will eventually accumulate below the dam. Some of it is <a href="https://www.hcn.org/articles/pollution-a-26-000-ton-pile-of-radioactive-waste-lies-under-the-waters-and-silt-of-lake-powell">laced with toxic materials</a> from mining decades ago. As more of the canyon is exposed, it may become necessary to create an active sediment management plan, including possible mechanical removal of some materials to protect public health. </p>
<p>The creation of Lake Powell also resulted in biological invasives, including <a href="https://www.ksl.com/article/50477865/feds-fighting-back-against-invasive-fish-species-near-lake-powell">nonnative fish and quagga mussels</a>. Some of these problems will abate as the reservoir declines and a free-flowing river replaces stagnant still water. </p>
<p>On a more positive note, native plants are <a href="https://www.12news.com/article/news/local/water-wars/lake-powell-water-dry-up-causing-glen-canyon-ecosystems-wildlife-flourish/75-06cac37f-d109-4188-a6b8-d1594d205a60">recolonizing side canyons</a> as they become exposed, creating verdant canyon bottoms. Restoring natural ecosystems in the canyon will require innovative biological management strategies as the habitat changes back to a more natural landscape. </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1608523484249858050"}"></div></p>
<p>Finally, as the emergent landscape expands and side canyons recover their natural scenery, Glen Canyon will become a unique tourist magnet. As the main channel reverts to a flowing river, users will no longer need an expensive boat; anyone with a kayak, canoe or raft will be able to enjoy the beauty of the canyons.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.nps.gov/glca/index.htm">Glen Canyon National Recreation Area</a>, which includes over 1.25 million acres around Lake Powell, was created to cater to people in motorized boats on a flat-water surface. Its staff will need to develop new capabilities and an active visitor management plan to protect the canyon and prevent the kind of crowding that is <a href="https://theconversation.com/overcrowded-us-national-parks-need-a-reservation-system-158864">overrunning other popular national parks</a>.</p>
<p>Other landscapes are likely to emerge across the West as climate change reshapes the region and numerous reservoirs decline. With proper planning, Glen Canyon can provide a lesson in how to manage them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/197340/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>I know many of the people involved in the controversy regarding the future of Lake Powell and Glen Canyon.</span></em></p>Lake Powell’s existential crisis is a unique opportunity to save a treasured landscape.Daniel Craig McCool, Professor Emeritus of Political Science, University of UtahLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1985062023-01-29T19:08:28Z2023-01-29T19:08:28ZIt’s hot, and your local river looks enticing. But is too germy for swimming?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506732/original/file-20230127-18-rcv50u.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=7%2C0%2C2594%2C1732&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Dan Himbrechts/AAP</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Swimming in rivers, creeks and lakes can be a fun way to cool off in summer. But contamination in natural waterways can pose a <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6023190/">risk to human health</a>. </p>
<p>Waterborne pathogens can <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/swimming/swimmers/rwi.html">cause</a> acute gastrointestinal illnesses such as diarrhea and vomiting. Other common illnesses include skin rashes, respiratory problems, and eye and ear infections.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, it can be hard to find out if a waterway in Australia is safe for recreation. By contrast, a comprehensive system in Aotearoa-New Zealand, called <a href="https://www.lawa.org.nz/explore-data/swimming/">Can I Swim Here?</a>, provides timely water quality information for 800 beach, river and lake sites.</p>
<p>We have investigated the benefits and barriers associated with opening up waterways for recreation. Unsurprisingly, ensuring a local swimming site is safe is key to getting people using it. That includes giving people access to accurate information about water quality.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="two women jump into waterway" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506729/original/file-20230127-14-zug4v0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506729/original/file-20230127-14-zug4v0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506729/original/file-20230127-14-zug4v0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506729/original/file-20230127-14-zug4v0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506729/original/file-20230127-14-zug4v0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506729/original/file-20230127-14-zug4v0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506729/original/file-20230127-14-zug4v0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">It can be hard to find out if a waterway in Australia is safe for swimming.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Dan Himbrechts/AAP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Can swimming really make you sick?</h2>
<p><a href="https://www.cdc.gov/healthywater/swimming/swimmers/rwi.html">Contaminated water</a> can exist in swimming pools and spas, as well as oceans, lakes, and rivers, exposing humans to a range of pathogens. </p>
<p>According to <a href="https://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/topics/water/beaches/is-it-safe-to-swim/what-are-the-health-risks-for-swimmers">official advice</a> in New South Wales, common waterborne pathogens include:</p>
<ul>
<li><p>enteric bacteria such as Escherichia coli (E.coli) or Enterococci, that live in the intestinal tracts of all warm-blooded animals and can enter water as faecal matter (or poo). They can cause gastroenteritis, skin and ear infections and dysentery</p></li>
<li><p>viruses such as noroviruses and hepatitis. They can cause diarrhoea, vomiting, hepatitis and respiratory disease</p></li>
<li><p>protozoa such as giardia which, once ingested, can live as parasites in humans and animals and cause diarrhoea.</p></li>
</ul>
<p>Australian <a href="https://academic.oup.com/aje/article/170/12/1469/157126?login=false">research</a> has documented a link between gastroeneritis and people swimming in public pools and freshwater sites such as rivers, lakes and dams. </p>
<p>Other water quality hazards for swimming include toxic <a href="https://www.health.vic.gov.au/water/health-effects-of-blue-green-algae">blue-green algae</a> and exposure to chemical pollutants.</p>
<p>Recent floods in Australia have led to an elevated risk of water contamination. As others have <a href="https://theconversation.com/travelling-around-australia-this-summer-heres-how-to-know-if-the-water-is-safe-to-drink-196294">noted</a>, flood waters can be <a href="https://www.epa.vic.gov.au/for-community/environmental-information/water/heavy-rainfall-events/how-to-manage-waste-after-a-flood/health-risks-from-flood-waters#:%7E:text=Floodwater%20is%20often%20contaminated%20by,and%20skin%20infections%2C%20and%20rashes">highly polluted</a> with disease-causing organisms, including from sewerage overflows.</p>
<p>So how do swimming locations get contaminated? Pollution can come from untreated sewage, or runoff containing animal poo or fertilisers. The <a href="https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/04/50-of-u-s-lakes-and-rivers-are-too-polluted-for-swimming-fishing-drinking">source could be</a> chemicals from nearby industrial activities, or the water users themselves.</p>
<p>Thankfully, most disease outbreaks from swimming are not fatal. An exception is the amoeba <a href="https://www.health.nsw.gov.au/Infectious/factsheets/Pages/naegleria-fowleri.aspx">Naegleria fowleri</a>. It lives in warmer waters and can cause amoebic meningitis, a potentially fatal brain disease.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-stunning-recovery-of-a-heavily-polluted-river-in-the-heart-of-the-blue-mountains-world-heritage-area-176246">The stunning recovery of a heavily polluted river in the heart of the Blue Mountains World Heritage area</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Rubbish-strewn water with bird flying above" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506731/original/file-20230127-18-lvaol7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506731/original/file-20230127-18-lvaol7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506731/original/file-20230127-18-lvaol7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506731/original/file-20230127-18-lvaol7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506731/original/file-20230127-18-lvaol7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506731/original/file-20230127-18-lvaol7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506731/original/file-20230127-18-lvaol7.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Rain and flooding can cause pollutants to run into waterways.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">James Ross/AAP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>How safe is your local swimming hole?</h2>
<p>In Australia, guidance on recreational water quality tends to focus on ocean beaches. For example, NSW’s <a href="https://www.environment.nsw.gov.au/topics/water/beaches/beachwatch-water-quality-program">Beachwatch</a> program cover more than 200 NSW coastal (and some estuary) beaches. The advice is based on likelihood of rain combined with testing swimming sites for faecal bacteria. </p>
<p>The Victorian government also <a href="https://www.epa.vic.gov.au/for-community/summer-water-quality/water-quality-across-victoria">provides</a> coastal swimming guidance for 36 beaches in Port Phillip Bay.</p>
<p>But away from the coast, information on the water quality of our local rivers, creeks and lakes, is sparse. </p>
<p>In NSW, advice exists for swimming and boating at <a href="https://www.penrithcity.nsw.gov.au/waste-environment/environment/recreational-water-quality">four sites</a> on the Nepean River in Western Sydney. Information is provided for a recently reopened swimming site at <a href="https://www.cityofparramatta.nsw.gov.au/water-quality-lake-parramatta">Lake Parramatta</a> and for swimming at some <a href="https://www.bmcc.nsw.gov.au/waterquality#recwater">Blue Mountains sites</a>.</p>
<p>In Victoria, the <a href="https://www.epa.vic.gov.au/for-community/summer-water-quality/yarra-watch">Yarra Watch</a> program monitors four swimming sites in freshwater stretches of the Yarra River, upstream of Melbourne. </p>
<p>And authorities in Canberra <a href="https://www.theswimguide.org/beach/8445">provide</a> regular water quality monitoring and swimming <a href="https://www.cityservices.act.gov.au/news/news-and-events-items/water_quality_in_our_lakes_and_ponds#current_advice">advice</a> for lakes and rivers.</p>
<p>But in contrast to Australia, New Zealand provides far more detailed and broad guidance.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="people swimming in river" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506725/original/file-20230127-25-c9kdxe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C1952%2C7947%2C3534&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506725/original/file-20230127-25-c9kdxe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506725/original/file-20230127-25-c9kdxe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506725/original/file-20230127-25-c9kdxe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506725/original/file-20230127-25-c9kdxe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506725/original/file-20230127-25-c9kdxe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506725/original/file-20230127-25-c9kdxe.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Authorities in Canberra provide regular water quality monitoring and swimming advice.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Lukas Coch/AAP</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>How New Zealand does it</h2>
<p>New Zealand’s world-leading national program <a href="https://www.lawa.org.nz/explore-data/swimming/">Can I swim here?</a> enables people to find the best places to swim across 800 beach, river and lake sites across the country. </p>
<p>The advice is provided by <a href="https://www.lawa.org.nz/about">LAWA</a> (Land, Air, Water Aotearoa), a collaboration between regional councils, the New Zealand government, scientific experts and academics, and a philanthropist organisation.</p>
<p>The data available includes both the latest weekly water quality test results, and results dating back five years.</p>
<p>The guidance also includes an <a href="https://www.lawa.org.nz/explore-data/swimming/">interactive map</a> (see below) where users can zoom to swimming sites in their region.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="map of NewZealand showing red, orange and green dots" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506736/original/file-20230127-11-cprhoa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/506736/original/file-20230127-11-cprhoa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=710&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506736/original/file-20230127-11-cprhoa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=710&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506736/original/file-20230127-11-cprhoa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=710&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506736/original/file-20230127-11-cprhoa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=893&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506736/original/file-20230127-11-cprhoa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=893&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/506736/original/file-20230127-11-cprhoa.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=893&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The ‘Can I swim here?’ site features an interactive map.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">https://www.lawa.org.nz</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>More work is needed</h2>
<p>Everyone loves to be around, on and in the water, especially during summer. As well as providing a way to cool down, local swimming holes are great places for people to socialise, exercise and engage with nature – especially for those not near a beach.</p>
<p>Governments are recognising the <a href="https://www.dpie.nsw.gov.au/premiers-priorities/great-public-spaces/open-space/open-spaces-program/places-to-swim">real opportunity</a> to open up underused waterways for recreation across Australia. But for the sake of our communities, more work is needed on improving water quality and sharing information. </p>
<p>Australia has a lot to learn from New Zealand and <a href="https://www.bern.com/en/aare-river/floating-favorite-routes">other countries</a> on how to manage our waterways for recreational use. And ongoing research, partnering with government and industry, is clearly needed.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/travelling-around-australia-this-summer-heres-how-to-know-if-the-water-is-safe-to-drink-196294">Travelling around Australia this summer? Here's how to know if the water is safe to drink</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
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<img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/198506/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ian A Wright has received funding from industry, as well as Commonwealth, NSW and local governments. He formerly worked for Sydney Water Corporation.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nicky Morrison has received funding from industry, as well as NSW and local governments.</span></em></p>Ensuring a swimming site is safe is key to getting people using it. That means giving people timely information about water quality.Ian A. Wright, Associate Professor in Environmental Science, Western Sydney UniversityNicky Morrison, Professor of Planning and Director of Urban Transformations Research Centre, Western Sydney UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1915812022-11-09T14:13:07Z2022-11-09T14:13:07ZCrime is lower when cities are greener: evidence from South Africa supports the link<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/491269/original/file-20221024-19-ig161m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5084%2C3389&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Investment in public parks can help reduce crime. </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/western-cape-south-africa-man-wearing-protective-clothing-news-photo/1219978375?phrase=gardens%20and%20public%20parks%20in%20south%20africa&adppopup=true">Peter Titmuss/Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images.</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>South Africa’s population is urbanising at a rapid pace. The sheer rate of change poses challenges to planning for sustainable and liveable cities.</p>
<p>Part of what make cities work is having green spaces, such as parks, sports fields, nature trails and street trees. These provide many social, ecological and economic <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0160412018331751?via%3Dihub">benefits</a>. Research from multiple countries such as <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1618866713001350?casa_token=pwYnNL6ExSoAAAAA:Y-VhMZ6qhTz7pHzmIUCZAKX2dYtbrH_fm8SipbLilGnxEKmulM6hDHG2vVnnR7aMMf1M6VTVdQ">Australia</a>, China, Finland, India, the <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/16/24/5119">US</a> and South Africa has shown this.</p>
<p>Aside from looking good and providing recreation, urban green spaces improve air quality, physical and mental health, and regulate storm water flows. They counteract urban heat islands, store carbon and create jobs.</p>
<p>Some communities nevertheless oppose urban greening efforts because they fear that green spaces and street trees provide places for <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1618866713001350">criminals to hide</a>. Such fears are not unique to South Africa and have been reported from cities in both developed and developing countries.</p>
<p>A great deal of research has been done on urban greening and its association with crime levels. But most of these studies have been conducted in Europe and North America, which are very different socially and economically to developing countries and have markedly lower rates of crime. </p>
<p>We <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004896972201097X">conducted research</a> to complement the evidence from the global north. Our study is the first ever national level analysis of the relationship between various measures of urban greenness and three different classes of crime: property, violent and sexual crimes. </p>
<p>Our findings, based on research in South Africa, lend further credence to calls for urban greening to be adopted as a major strategy in cities – for both environmental sustainability, as well as social sustainability.</p>
<h2>Drilling down</h2>
<p>We used 10 years of precinct-level crime statistics in South Africa to test the hypothesis that green space is associated with reduced crime rates. South Africa has one of the highest crime rates in the <a href="https://www.gallup.com/analytics/322247/gallup-global-law-and-order-report-2020.aspx">world</a>, making it an important test of the relationship between urban greening and crime. </p>
<p>Using the broadest greenness measure – total green space – the results of this national-scale study corroborate many <a href="https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/16/24/5119">previous studies</a> from the global north indicating that greener neighbourhoods have significantly lower rates of violent and property crimes. Thus, the relationship reported in other countries and contexts appears to be robust in even a relatively high crime context like South Africa. </p>
<p>To gauge the relationship <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004896972201097X">in South Africa</a> we used several measures of urban greenness, several different crime categories, and a national analysis.</p>
<p>We obtained crime statistics per police precinct (there are 1,152 police precints) between 2010 and 2019 from the South African Police Service and aggregated them into property, violent and sexual crimes (expressed as per 100,000 citizens for each police precinct). </p>
<p>We then used remote sensing to calculate the total area of green space per precinct, the proportional (percentage) cover of trees, and the average distance to the closest formal or informal park.</p>
<p>We found that greener areas had lower rates of both violent and property crimes. But there was no relationship with the rate of sexual crimes. A more mixed picture was revealed when considering tree cover specifically, where property crime was higher with more tree cover, but violent crimes were fewer. </p>
<p>However, property crimes were higher in locations close to public parks and sites with more trees. </p>
<p>Proximity to parks showed no relationship with the rates of violent or sexual crimes. </p>
<p>The concentration of property crimes in neighbourhoods with more trees and parks can be explained by such areas typically being where more affluent households are found.</p>
<p>But well-maintained public parks, and those with fencing, lighting, playing fields and some sort of security show lower crime levels in adjacent areas than poorly maintained parks or those <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0022427816666309?casa_token=bVeZkvibpZcAAAAA%3ADXzO3-2POkIM96kbujiRf3DE_KmvWZGjR0owrGsu2ClZQiJr3bdV6RYsdhs-R8d_SiWkpaMvYrMx">lacking basic facilities</a>.</p>
<h2>What needs to be done</h2>
<p>These findings add further impetus to arguments for urban planners and decision-makers in South Africa (and similar contexts) to be more proactive and ambitious in including and integrating urban green spaces and trees into urban developments. </p>
<p>Planners and authorities often downplay such calls because they are viewed as coming from an environmental lobby, and because – they say – there are more pressing economic and social development <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0264837714001501?casa_token=_ZixOjEqP4sAAAAA:0LkAd_dHkAXGoUMgJmX_nkxHtxO8Na0i5J1O23SvXIauJ3vap3uiAEtfYFB0Kn3JPcXTRmk48Q">needs</a>. </p>
<p>But this research shows that benefits of urban greening extend well beyond an environmental agenda. They embrace social inclusivity and sustainability too, alongside the well-established public health benefits. </p>
<p>Urban greening, therefore, needs to be one of the foremost considerations in urban planning and development in the country. It also requires budgets, expertise and strategies beyond the planning phase to allow for regular tree and green space maintenance that keeps them functional and attractive to local citizens. </p>
<p>The research also supports calls for urban greening to be <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/21665095.2021.1950019">integrated</a> into any holistic crime prevention strategy. </p>
<p><em>Lizzette Lancaster, Manager: Crime and Justice Information Hub, Institute of Security Studies, Pretoria, South Africa, contributed to this article.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/191581/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Charlie Shackleton receives funding from the national Research Foundation (South Africa). </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Andrew Faull is affiliated with the Institute for Security Studies (ISS) and receives funding from the Hanns Seidel Foundation.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Gregory Breetzke, Ian Edelstein, and Zander Venter do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>People may think that green spaces often hide criminals. On the contrary, there is evidence they contribute to reducing crime.Charlie Shackleton, Professor & Research Chair in Interdisciplinary Science in Land and Natural Resource Use for Sustainable Livelihoods, Rhodes UniversityAndrew Faull, Research Associate at UCT's Centre of Criminology, Consultant at the Institute for Security Studies (ISS), University of Cape TownGregory Breetzke, Associate Professor, Department of Geography, Geoinformatics and Meteorology, University of PretoriaIan Edelstein, Researcher, University of Cape TownZander Venter, Spatial ecologist, The Norwegian Institute for Nature ResearchLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1894422022-10-04T12:23:50Z2022-10-04T12:23:50ZFour essential features to seek in an after-school program<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/487545/original/file-20220930-18-vt20ou.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=16%2C8%2C5542%2C3667&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Effective homework help can reduce stress for students and their families.
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/staff-member-assists-a-child-as-they-attend-online-classes-news-photo/1231222620?adppopup=true">Patrick T. Fallon via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When it comes to after-school programs, there are all types from which to choose. But when it comes to finding a program that offers high-quality service and engaging activities that help children do better in school, that can be a challenge.</p>
<p>I know this because in the early 2000s, I evaluated after-school sites in the state of Florida as part of the federal <a href="https://www2.ed.gov/programs/21stcclc/index.html">21st Century Community Learning Centers</a> program.</p>
<p>I’ve seen some highly effective programs, such as one that taught students with developmental disabilities how to kayak and sail. But I’ve also seen a program in which officials seemed to be packing as many kids as they could into their facility because the program got funded based on how many students were registered. There were no structured activities. They even balked at my assessing how well they delivered services like homework assistance. They had so many kids to oversee, the notion of providing students with high-quality help seemed hardly to be a consideration. </p>
<p>At a different program I went to evaluate, at a rural high school in the Florida Panhandle, kids didn’t even know they were in a program.</p>
<p>“Program? What program?” a student responded to me once when I announced the reason I was there. “Coach just told us to meet someone in the library today for something.”</p>
<p>That was nearly 20 years ago. Since then, after-school programming has continuously <a href="http://www.afterschoolalliance.org/AA3PM/#resources">struggled to meet demand</a>, so finding a high-quality program may be even more difficult.</p>
<p>In 2020, one survey found, there were <a href="http://www.afterschoolalliance.org/AA3PM/#resources">24.6 million children</a> who would have enrolled in an after-school program if one were available to them – 5.2 million more than in 2014, when the figure stood at 19.4 million.</p>
<p>Participation in an after-school program offers many benefits. Research has found, for instance, that it can <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10464-010-9300-6">boost students’ overall academic performance and behavior in school</a>.</p>
<p>As an educator who focuses on how to ensure after-school programs actually help children learn, here are four elements that I urge parents and other caretakers to consider to make sure their children’s time in a program is time is well spent. Since many students <a href="https://www.npr.org/2022/06/22/1105970186/pandemic-learning-loss-findings">suffered learning losses</a> <a href="https://doi.org/10.3390/children8121134">during the COVID-19 pandemic</a>, I believe a sharper academic focus in after-school activities has taken on even greater importance.</p>
<h2>1. Objectives and purpose</h2>
<p>If a parent wants only a place for their child to be safe until they get off work, a program’s purpose may not matter. But <a href="http://afterschoolalliance.org/documents/AA3PM/National-AA3PM-Healthy-Futures-2022-Fact-Sheet.pdf">most adults believe</a> after-school programs should enable kids to explore topics of interest, try out new things and gain skills like communication and teamwork.</p>
<p>If a program description explicitly states that it provides homework assistance, tutoring, academic enrichment activities or opportunities to do community service, that is a good first step. Some programs have no discernible objectives, or they are broad and vague.</p>
<p>When programs use project-based academic activities, they can be effective in helping students to better understand specific subjects, such as math. The programs can be even more effective when the activities <a href="https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED522625.pdf">incorporate material from the child’s regular school</a>.</p>
<p>That way, a program can <a href="http://www.expandinglearning.org/sites/default/files/em_articles/3_afterschoolprogramquality.pdf">maximize its academic impact</a>. School-based programs have an advantage in this regard, since program staff can more easily communicate with staff from a child’s school.</p>
<h2>2. Scheduled activities</h2>
<p>If a program lacks a schedule that spells out what students will be doing, that can be a telltale sign that it doesn’t have much to offer. In my experience as a program evaluator, high-quality programs usually schedule activities in a way that helps promote their objectives.</p>
<p>For example, there are benefits when a specific time is set up for participants to complete homework with qualified staff who can provide meaningful help. When students complete their homework before coming home, it <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10566-021-09602-8">lessens stress</a> for students and their families by saving more time for family activities and sleep.</p>
<h2>3. Qualified staff</h2>
<p>Parents should inquire about what kind of training and credentials staff have to do their jobs.</p>
<p>In terms of credentials, some examples include a <a href="https://www.cdacouncil.org/en/">child development associate</a> certification, a certification in <a href="https://youth.gov/youth-topics/positive-youth-development">positive youth development</a> or a certification through the <a href="https://netanational.org/">National Enrichment Teachers Association</a>. Such credentials show <a href="https://acycpjournal.pitt.edu/ojs/jcycw/article/view/433">another level of professionalism</a>.</p>
<p>Some programs may <a href="https://niost.org/Afterschool-Matters-Fall-2017/fostering-arts-education-through-a-university-afterschool-partnership">partner with a local college or university</a> to bring on college students as volunteers. Research shows that college students bring a certain <a href="https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED498868.pdf">passion and enthusiasm</a> to programs, and that participants “<a href="https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED498868.pdf">feel special</a>” when older peers take an interest in them.</p>
<p>Parents should also ask how many staff members are on hand. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services <a href="https://childcare.gov/consumer-education/ratios-and-group-sizes">recommends a ratio</a> of no more than 10 to 12 school-age students per qualified adult and groups of no more than 20 to 24 students with two qualified adults. When group and class sizes are reasonable, it better enables staff to provide high-quality learning experiences that can also include individual attention as warranted.</p>
<h2>4. Daily attendance</h2>
<p>Daily attendance patterns can offer clues about the level of student interest in a program. Don’t assume or accept that attendance is low because a program is too academic. Research has found that academic activities <a href="https://www.wallacefoundation.org/knowledge-center/Documents/The-Value-of-Out-of-School-Time-Programs.pdf">do not lower attendance</a> at high-quality after-school programs.</p>
<p>Officials at successful programs expect regular attendance and collect attendance data. They know that if students don’t attend their programs, it will be a big challenge for the program to meet its goals and objectives.</p>
<p>When a program has clearly defined objectives, a schedule to meet those objectives, qualified staff members and students who attend regularly, the program tends to yield <a href="https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED545471.pdf">positive results</a>, such as
<a href="https://eric.ed.gov/?id=ED499113">higher test scores and better work habits</a>. </p>
<p>Parents and caretakers who know to look for these features should be better able to choose the best after-school program to meet their children’s needs.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/189442/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>David S. Fleming receives funding from the Nita M. Lowey 21st Century Community Learning Centers </span></em></p>A scholar who used to evaluate after-school programs says they should do more than just be a place for kids to hang out and socialize.David S. Fleming, Professor of Education and Department Chair, Clemson UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1827442022-05-17T18:56:00Z2022-05-17T18:56:00Z3 questions to ask political candidates about sport and recreation services<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463782/original/file-20220517-16-inrycv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C7765%2C5029&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Sport and recreation are political issues because different governments view their role in delivering these services differently. A better understanding of how political parties view sport and recreation can help inform voters' decisions when they head to the polls.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Recreation and sport provide important opportunities to improve physical health, quality of life and well-being in our communities. As a result, some data suggest that <a href="https://www.prontario.org/public/policy/2018/2018MunicipalCouncilOrientation.pdf">98 per cent of Canadians</a> believe that recreation and parks are essential services. </p>
<p>However, recent data also indicates <a href="https://sirc.ca/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/CSP-2012-evaluation-Summary-Report-Final-Feb12-21.pdf">a decline in sport participation</a> over the past 20 years. In 2021, adults in Canada <a href="https://participaction.cdn.prismic.io/participaction/164cd8d0-80c4-481f-a359-a90ce9aa5390_PA-AdultReportCard-Infographic_EN.pdf">received an F for sedentary behaviours</a> on the <a href="https://www.participaction.com/en-ca/resources/adult-report-card">Participaction Report Card</a>, suggesting that participation in recreation and physical activities is also declining.</p>
<p>There are a variety of reasons for why participation in sport and recreation is on the decline, including lack of opportunities, affordability and accessibility. Our research looks at how government decisions impact sport participation for different groups of people and across different areas.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1470748160633061377"}"></div></p>
<p>Our work involves understanding the <a href="https://theconversation.com/wicked-problems-government-involvement-in-sport-is-fraught-with-issues-175010">complicated systems</a> that deliver sport and recreation opportunities and how these systems differ across provinces, territories <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fspor.2022.836525">and regions</a> in Canada.</p>
<h2>Influence of regional policy</h2>
<p>All levels of government make <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/sports/federal-government-announces-new-funding-inclusive-sport-initiatives-1.5994130">large investments</a> to improve access to sport and recreation. Decisions of elected officials regarding these services can help enhance the social, economic and cultural dimensions of community well-being. </p>
<p>However, different governments view these services and their role in delivering them differently. This turns sport and recreation into a political issue. </p>
<p>The <a href="https://www.canada.ca/en/canadian-heritage/services/sport-canada.html#a2">Canadian Sport Policy</a> acknowledges how sport and physical activity is <a href="https://sirc.ca/wp-content/uploads/files/content/docs/Document/csp2012_en.pdf">involved in many sectors of society</a>. Education and municipal recreation organizations are particularly important in these systems.</p>
<p>Therefore, <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt5hjk9x.4?seq=1">provincial and territorial governments play important roles</a> in how sport and recreation systems work. </p>
<h2>Questions for candidates</h2>
<p>A closer look at regional policy and its effects is an important step in creating effective sport and recreation systems. A better understanding of how political parties view sport and recreation can help inform our decisions when we head to the polls.</p>
<p>Here, we provide three questions that voters can ask their local provincial candidates to understand how their party’s policies will affect the sport and recreation sector. While the details can be adapted based on your province, territory or region, these represent a good starting point for discussing these issues.</p>
<p><strong>1. Which ministry do you believe should assume the responsibility for the portfolio of sport and recreation, and why?</strong></p>
<p>Across Canada, the responsibility of sport and recreation falls under the direction of various provincial ministries. These <a href="https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/valr75&div=30&id=&page=">administrative arrangements</a> affect the sitting government’s perspective and how policy is made and implemented. </p>
<p>For example, in the last 10 years, sport and recreation in Ontario has moved between the Ministry of Economic Development and Tourism and the Ministry of Health Promotion. They now sit with the <a href="https://www.ontario.ca/page/ministry-heritage-sport-tourism-culture-industries">Ministry of Heritage, Sport, Tourism and Culture Industries</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="People waiting in line outside of an election polling station" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463387/original/file-20220516-19-5n7qra.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463387/original/file-20220516-19-5n7qra.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463387/original/file-20220516-19-5n7qra.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463387/original/file-20220516-19-5n7qra.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=384&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463387/original/file-20220516-19-5n7qra.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=483&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463387/original/file-20220516-19-5n7qra.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=483&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463387/original/file-20220516-19-5n7qra.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=483&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Ontarians will head to the polls on June 2 for the 2022 Ontario general election.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">THE CANADIAN PRESS/Frank Gunn</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Similarly, <a href="https://www.gov.mb.ca/chc/">Manitoba</a> and <a href="https://www2.gov.bc.ca/gov/content/governments/organizational-structure/ministries-organizations/ministries/tourism-arts-culture">British Columbia</a> locate sport and recreation with tourism, arts and culture ministries. Nunavut administers programs through the <a href="https://gov.nu.ca/sports-and-recreation">Department of Community and Government Services </a> and Prince Edward Island through the <a href="https://www.princeedwardisland.ca/en/topic/sports-recreation-and-physical-activity">Department of Health and Wellness</a>.</p>
<p>Generally, sport and recreation are either aligned with health promotion and healthy living or the promotion of tourism and economic development. These distinctions have important implications for policy development and implementation.</p>
<p><strong>2. How will your government close the infrastructure funding gap for municipalities’ sports and recreation facilities?</strong> </p>
<p>According to the <a href="http://canadainfrastructure.ca/downloads/canadian-infrastructure-report-card-2019.pdf">Canadian Infrastructure Report Card 2019</a>, an alarming amount of municipal infrastructure is in poor or very poor condition. Sport and recreation facilities in neglected conditions represent an immediate need for action across the country. </p>
<p>The rehabilitation or replacement of these facilities is <a href="https://sirc.ca/news/cpra-applauds-liberal-government-investment-in-recreation-infrastructure/">required in the next five to 10 years</a> to ensure their services continue to meet community needs. Unfortunately, these costs often fall on municipalities.</p>
<p>Infrastructure funding shortfalls burden municipalities all across Canada. Many communities <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/ottawa/community-centre-program-funding-cut-1.5211207">struggle with securing funds</a> to maintain sport and recreation facilities for their citizens. Governments need a plan of action for managing and repairing facilities that are in disrepair.</p>
<p><strong>3. How will your government support access to sport and recreation for diverse groups such as women and girls, Indigenous people, people in rural and remote communities and people with disabilities?</strong></p>
<p>COVID-19 continues to have a profound <a href="https://assets.website-files.com/5eb9ca182f6df037590c28ea/60f5a049b617f857b0d14be4_Change%20The%20Game%20Research_FINAL.pdf">effect on organized sport and community recreation</a> programs. In addition, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1353/ces.2021.0020">recent local</a> and <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/08/10/sports/hockey/nhl-racism-protests-george-floyd.html">global events</a> have raised awareness of social inequities related to the status of women and girls, and both Black and Indigenous communities in Canada. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Teacher leading a group of students in stretches" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463379/original/file-20220516-14-quktzw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/463379/original/file-20220516-14-quktzw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463379/original/file-20220516-14-quktzw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463379/original/file-20220516-14-quktzw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463379/original/file-20220516-14-quktzw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463379/original/file-20220516-14-quktzw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/463379/original/file-20220516-14-quktzw.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Programs such as the After School Physical Activity Program in Northwest Territories provide funding to schools and organizations to deliver physical activity programs for children after school.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>To respond to this, coordinated efforts to address inequities in sport and recreation systems are needed. </p>
<p>Provincial and territorial governments can be an important catalyst for addressing issues related to inequity and accessibility of services. For example, Nova Scotia offers the <a href="https://sportnovascotia.ca/funding-programs-and-eligibility/">Equity, Diversity and Inclusion sport fund</a> to support programming for underrepresented communities.</p>
<p>Programs such as the <a href="https://www.maca.gov.nt.ca/en/services/after-school-physical-activity-program">After School Physical Activity Program </a> in the Northwest Territories provide funding to schools and organizations to deliver physical activity programs for children after school.</p>
<h2>Advocating for local organizations</h2>
<p>Public, private and nonprofit organizations all play important roles in community sport and recreation in our municipalities. All of these organizations can benefit from strong policy frameworks designed intentionally to enhance community well-being. </p>
<p>Sport and recreation are important services that can lead to a range of benefits in our communities. But these outcomes don’t materialize spontaneously. Voters need to hold their candidates and political parties to account on these issues and advocate for support for sport and recreation from provincial and territorial governments.</p>
<p><em>This article was co-authored by Tammy Borgen-Flood, a research assistant at Brock University’s faculty of applied health sciences.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/182744/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kyle Rich receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada.</span></em></p>Voters need to hold political candidates and their parties to account on sport and recreation issues and advocate for support from provincial and territorial governments.Kyle Rich, Assistant Professor of Recreation and Leisure Studies, Brock UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1675242021-09-21T13:49:01Z2021-09-21T13:49:01ZReturn to play: Tips to prevent COVID-19 transmission in sport and recreation facilities<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420543/original/file-20210910-17-1yf5xm1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=16%2C0%2C5447%2C3645&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Facilities should work with community sport organizations and their personnel to develop return to activity frameworks.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Since COVID-19 lockdowns began last year, the <a href="https://capacoa.ca/en/research/covid-impact-statistics/">sport and recreation industry has been one of the hardest hit</a>. And as we move towards a slow reopening, variants of concern (like the Delta variant) threaten the industry’s safe resumption. Despite vaccination efforts, <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.7196%2FSAMJ.2021.v111i9.16005">some say herd immunity is unlikely</a>, and we may have to learn to live with the virus.</p>
<p>In Canada, lockdowns have had <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17113899">negative impacts on levels of physical activity, sedentary behaviour and mental health</a>. And unhealthy lifestyle trends are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbi.2020.05.059">associated with severe complications from COVID-19 and hospital admissions</a>.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/a-year-into-the-pandemic-covid-19-exercise-slump-has-hit-women-harder-157302">A year into the pandemic, COVID-19 exercise slump has hit women harder</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Sport and recreation facilities help support healthy lifestyles. Throughout the pandemic, however, <a href="https://doi.org/10.3346/jkms.2020.35.e288">they’ve become difficult to safely</a> operate because of the elevated respiratory activity and the potential for airborne transmission of the virus. As a result, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.smhs.2021.01.002">many have been forced to close or operate under strict guidelines</a>. </p>
<p>Learning to live with the virus must involve considering how to support health and well-being. And strategies need to be developed to mitigate the risk of transmission in sport and recreation facilities.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A sign reads 'Sorry, we're closed' on the window of a workout room" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420544/original/file-20210910-21-gt3zb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420544/original/file-20210910-21-gt3zb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420544/original/file-20210910-21-gt3zb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420544/original/file-20210910-21-gt3zb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420544/original/file-20210910-21-gt3zb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420544/original/file-20210910-21-gt3zb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420544/original/file-20210910-21-gt3zb5.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Many gyms and fitness centres had to close during COVID-19.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Mitigating the spread of COVID-19</h2>
<p>We looked at <a href="https://doi.org/10.51224/SRXIV.4">peer-reviewed articles to identify recommendations for those involved in designing, managing and working in sport and recreation facilities</a> to help mitigate the risk of COVID-19 transmission — our article is a preprint and currently yet to be peer-reviewed. We categorized recommendations in accordance with the <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/hierarchy/">National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health’s (NIOSH) guidelines</a> for addressing occupational hazards, in this case COVID-19. </p>
<p>According to the guidelines, the most protection is offered by eliminating or substituting the hazard from the workplace, implementing engineering controls, adjusting how people work through administrative controls and using personal protective equipment as the last line of defence.</p>
<p>Our analysis resulted in recommendations that will help the sport and recreation industry mitigate the spread of COVID-19. Here is a summary of the recommendations.</p>
<h2>Eliminating/substituting the hazard: Mandatory vaccination policy</h2>
<p>A <a href="https://doi.org/10.3201/eid2708.210833">mandatory immunization</a> or <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00913847.2021.1885964">vaccination passport policy</a> is the safest option. </p>
<p>Given the close proximity people often find themselves in at sport and recreation facilities, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00948705.2020.1750960">this policy should be considered as important as the sport equipment</a> that keeps people safe.</p>
<h2>Engineering controls: Altering the built environment</h2>
<p>Architects, engineers and facility directors should consider altering the built environment. These facilities often have complex rooms of varying sizes that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.buildenv.2021.107659">require improved ventilation and air handling systems</a>. </p>
<p>Rooms and corridors will need to be <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.buildenv.2020.107022">redesigned so that they allow for physical distancing</a>, and the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2020-103227">number of high-touch surfaces within facilities will likely need to be reduced through automation</a>. To improve user hygiene, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/23750472.2020.1779116">hand-washing stations should be installed throughout</a>, allowing users to use them before, after and during an activity.</p>
<h2>Administrative controls: Standard operating procedures</h2>
<p>Facilities operators should <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsams.2020.05.004">develop COVID-19 management plans and integrate them into their standard operating procedures</a>, and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1590/1806-9282.66.10.1328">health screening will need to be conducted daily</a> for anyone entering the facility. </p>
<p>Rooms, surfaces and equipment will need to be <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.asmart.2020.07.006">cleaned more frequently</a>, and communication plans will need to be developed that educate and encourage safe user behaviour. The operation of <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsams.2020.05.004">food and beverage services will need to be altered</a>, and items should be individually wrapped in disposable containers. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2020-103622">Clinical waste bins</a> will need to be available for potentially contaminated material like used masks, and facilities will need to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1590/1806-9282.66.10.1328">co-ordinate delivery schedules</a> with their suppliers to minimize contact with facility staff.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="A man inside a recreation facility wears a mask and holds a basketball, he's on a basketball court and people are playing in the background" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420546/original/file-20210910-13-194t0h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/420546/original/file-20210910-13-194t0h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420546/original/file-20210910-13-194t0h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420546/original/file-20210910-13-194t0h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420546/original/file-20210910-13-194t0h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420546/original/file-20210910-13-194t0h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/420546/original/file-20210910-13-194t0h1.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">An athletic trainer wears a face mask during a basketball game in Molfetta, Italy.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Administrative controls: Facility capacity and spacing</h2>
<p>General <a href="https://doi.org/10.7752/jpes.2021.s2127">facility capacity will need to be reduced</a> to allow for physical distancing, and travelling throughout a facility will need to be <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssci.2021.105243">reconsidered to reduce travel distances and contacts</a>. </p>
<p>Because of the moist environment and airborne particles in sport and recreation facilities, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.prrv.2021.04.005">lockers should primarily be used as storage</a> and placed where physical distancing can be maintained. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/0748233720964651">Spectator areas will need to implement physical distancing</a> and consider installing partitions between seats. </p>
<h2>Administrative controls: Activities and equipment</h2>
<p>Return to activity guidelines should be created for each <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jsams.2020.05.004">activity and space with public health consultation</a>. <a href="https://doi.org/10.4085/610-20">Staggering facility scheduling will help minimize</a> unnecessary usage of facilities and personal contacts, and will assist with cleaning. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/23750472.2020.1779116">Accommodations will need to be made for populations</a> that are more vulnerable to COVID-19. The sharing of personal items like water bottles or towels <a href="https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2020-103622">must not be permitted</a>.</p>
<h2>Administrative controls: Staffing requirements</h2>
<p>The staff requirements of facilities and organizations that operate within them will need to change. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1136/bjsports-2020-103227">A COVID-19 supervisor should be appointed</a> to conduct regular health and safety evaluations, and all staff will <a href="https://doi.org/10.5960/dzsm.2020.441">need to be trained on the new COVID-19 standard operating procedures</a>. </p>
<p>Staff who can complete their tasks at home <a href="https://doi.org/10.1590/1806-9282.66.10.1328">should be encouraged to do so</a> to reduce the number of occupants within a facility at any time. Facilities should work with community sport organizations and their personnel (like coaches) to develop return to activity guidelines.</p>
<h2>Personal protective equipment: The last line of defence</h2>
<p>Extra personal protective equipment should be available, and all occupants should be required to wear masks when <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/23750472.2020.1783841">not engaged in physical activity</a>. Facility staff, coaches, trainers and other personnel <a href="https://doi.org/10.1590/1517-8692202026052019_0044">should be provided with and wear additional personal protective equipment appropriate for their role</a>.</p>
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<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-business-of-sports-resumes-amid-covid-19-but-at-what-cost-142793">The business of sports resumes amid COVID-19, but at what cost?</a>
</strong>
</em>
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<p>As we return to some degree of normalcy from the height of the pandemic, the sport and recreation industry will be essential for supporting our health and well-being. Therefore it is crucial that we evaluate the environment of sport and recreation facilities and implement measures that mitigate the risk of transmission so we can all enjoy them again.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/167524/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kevin Wilson is affiliated with NIRSA (National Intramural Recreational Sports Association), PRO (Parks and Recreation Ontario)</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Zachary Evans is affiliated with NASSM (North American Society for Sport Management) and SMA (Sport Marketing Association). </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Denver Brown and Joseph Miller do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>What are the best recommendations that would help mitigate the risk of COVID-19 transmission in sport and recreation facilities?Kevin Wilson, PhD Student, Recreation and Leisure Studies, University of WaterlooDenver Brown, Assistant Professor, Psychology, The University of Texas at San AntonioJoseph Miller, Research Assistant in Human Kinetics, University of WindsorZachary Evans, PhD Candidate, Sport Management, University of WindsorLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1659292021-08-25T12:25:33Z2021-08-25T12:25:33ZI studied people who think leisure is a waste of time – here’s what I found<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/417640/original/file-20210824-21-y4ocfx.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=16%2C26%2C3578%2C2505&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Some cultures champion rest more than others.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/four-construction-workers-take-a-nap-balanced-on-a-steel-news-photo/517292658?adppopup=true">Bettmann via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When I first took my now-husband to Turkey, I tried to prepare myself for anything that could go wrong – delayed flights, language difficulties, digestion issues. </p>
<p>But I wasn’t ready when, as we walked into a beautiful beach club on the Aegean coast, he grumbled, “What are we going to do?” </p>
<p>“What do you mean?” I said. “Lie down, enjoy the sun and the sea.” </p>
<p>“But what about the things to do – beach volleyball, Frisbees, water sports?” </p>
<p>“There isn’t any of that. We’re just here to relax.”</p>
<p>This was the first time I got a sense of our cultural differences. He’s American and I’m Turkish. He needed to “do stuff.” I wanted to chill. Over the years, he became better at relaxing – more Turkish, if you will. </p>
<p>But I started noticing all the ways the imperative to “do stuff” kept marching along in the U.S. </p>
<p>It morphed and migrated into pithy catchphrases like <a href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2012/08/25/what-yolo-only-teenagers-know-for-sure/Idso04FecrYzLa4KOOYpXO/story.html">YOLO</a> – “you only live once” – and “<a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0727T8WYZ/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1">rise and grind</a>.” I saw it in the way people <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2017/03/busyness-status-symbol/518178/">bragged about how busy they were</a>, as if it were a badge of honor. And I noticed it in the rise of “<a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/celinnedacosta/2019/04/28/stop-idolizing-hustle-culture-and-do-this-instead/">hustle culture</a>,” or the collective urge to get as much done in as little time as possible, while always keeping an eye on the next opportunity.</p>
<p>Underlying all of it is the belief that resting or relaxing is a waste of time. </p>
<p>I wondered: How might these attitudes influence people’s well-being? And are some cultures more likely than others to promote such beliefs?</p>
<h2>Ruining all the fun</h2>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2021.104198">In a series of new studies</a> I conducted with fellow marketing professors <a href="https://www.business.rutgers.edu/faculty/gabriela-tonietto">Gabbie Tonietto</a>, <a href="https://fisher.osu.edu/people/reczek.3">Rebecca Reczek</a> and <a href="https://www.hbs.edu/faculty/Pages/profile.aspx?facId=326229">Mike Norton</a>, we took a stab at finding some answers. </p>
<p>In one study, 141 undergraduate students participated at our behavioral lab at the Ohio State University. They arrived to complete a series of surveys in which we asked them the extent to which they agreed with certain statements – “Time spent on leisure activities is often wasted time,” “Most leisure activities are a way to burn time” – that measured whether they endorsed the idea that leisure is pointless.</p>
<p>During these otherwise monotonous and tedious studies, participants watched four funny and popular YouTube videos that were rated entertaining by a different set of participants. After watching all four videos, participants indicated how much they enjoyed them. </p>
<p>We found that participants who believed leisure to be wasteful didn’t enjoy the videos as much. </p>
<p>In a follow-up study, we asked participants to indicate how much they enjoyed engaging in a variety of leisurely experiences – some active, like exercising, and some passive, like watching TV. Others were social – hanging out with friends – or solitary, such as meditating.</p>
<p>We found that those who viewed leisure as wasteful tended to get less enjoyment out of all of the different types of activities. Furthermore, these people were also more likely to be stressed, anxious and depressed.</p>
<h2>An attitude that’s tough to shake</h2>
<p>In a different study, we wanted to see the extent to which this was a uniquely American phenomenon. So we recruited participants from France, the U.S. and India – countries chosen for being low, medium and high, respectively, on <a href="https://methods.sagepub.com/book/cross-cultural-analysis">Hofstede’s industry-indulgence dimension</a>, which captures the extent to which a given culture is work-oriented and values self-reliance.</p>
<p>We asked them to indicate the degree to which they agreed with the idea that leisure is wasteful. Consistent with the prevailing stereotypes, there were far fewer French participants who believed that leisure was wasteful compared to American and, especially, Indian ones. </p>
<p>But French people who held a negative view of leisure were as likely to be stressed, anxious and depressed as their American and Indian counterparts. So while Americans and Indians might more readily believe that leisure is wasteful, the consequences of holding this belief are universal. </p>
<p>The COVID-19 pandemic has had a pronounced effect on the way we <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/pdf/10.1177/2378023120982856">live, work</a> and <a href="https://www.pnas.org/content/118/9/e2016632118.short">socialize</a>. During this period, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2021/08/20/black-women-professionals-rest/">many people have taken a step back and reevaluated their priorities</a>.</p>
<p>We wondered whether people’s attitudes toward leisure had shifted. Since we had data from both pre- and post-pandemic studies, we were able to compare the two. </p>
<p>To our surprise, we didn’t find any evidence of these beliefs declining after the pandemic.</p>
<p>To us, this revealed how entrenched the belief that leisure is wasteful can be. </p>
<p>Another study affirmed it. In this one, participants read an article that either discussed the efficacy of coffee makers or described leisure in one of three possible ways: wasteful, unproductive or productive. Participants then played the video game Tetris for five minutes and told us how enjoyable it was. We found that those who read an article describing leisure as wasteful and unproductive didn’t enjoy the game as much as those who read about leisure being productive or read about coffee makers.</p>
<p>However, describing leisure as productive didn’t increase enjoyment beyond its baseline levels. So it appears that framing leisure as productive – say, as a good way to manage stress or recharge your batteries – doesn’t increase how much people enjoy leisure.</p>
<p>[<em>Get the best of The Conversation, every weekend.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/weekly-highlights-61?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=weeklybest">Sign up for our weekly newsletter</a>.]</p>
<h2>Not all leisure is equal</h2>
<p>In the studies I described above, we focused exclusively on what <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2018-15704-002">psychologists</a> call “terminal leisure” – leisure that takes place purely for enjoyment.</p>
<p>This differs from “instrumental leisure” – leisure that might serve a larger purpose, like making friends or staying healthy, and therefore feels more productive. </p>
<p>So we explored whether the negative attitudes toward leisure would be less detrimental for instrumental leisure activities.</p>
<p>In 2019, on the Monday after Halloween, we asked participants to recall what they did and tell us how much they enjoyed it. We found the belief that leisure was wasteful was particularly detrimental for the enjoyment of terminal activities like going to a party. On the other hand, it boosted the enjoyment of instrumental activities, such as taking their kids trick-or-treating, which could be seen as a bonding experience.</p>
<p>The good news? Whether a particular activity is terminal or instrumental leisure is relative and depends on the person and the situation. For instance, people may exercise for fun (a terminal motivation) or to lose weight (an instrumental motivation). The frame can always be changed.</p>
<p>It might not be easy to change what you believe about leisure. But by reframing leisurely activities as instrumental, more people can hopefully reap their true benefits: satisfaction, recuperation, improved mental health – and, yes, chilling on the beach for the sake of chilling on the beach.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/165929/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Selin Malkoc does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>‘Hustle culture’ is so pervasive in U.S. society that not even the coronavirus pandemic could shake the urge to prioritize productivity.Selin Malkoc, Associate Professor of Marketing, The Ohio State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1622232021-07-14T12:24:32Z2021-07-14T12:24:32ZDon’t hike so close to me: How the presence of humans can disturb wildlife up to half a mile away<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/409534/original/file-20210702-21-b9n87d.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=55%2C15%2C1802%2C855&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">What are you looking at?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/RvnoYa">Greg Shine, BLM/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Millions of Americans are traveling this summer as pandemic restrictions wind down. <a href="https://www.vogue.com/article/2021s-biggest-summer-travel-trend-the-great-outdoors">Rental bookings</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/overcrowded-us-national-parks-need-a-reservation-system-158864">crowds in national parks</a> show that many people are headed for the great outdoors.</p>
<p>Seeing animals and birds is one of the main draws of spending time in nature. But as researchers who study <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=-Spw_2cAAAAJ&hl=en">conservation</a>, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=uflMR0gAAAAJ&hl=en">wildlife</a> and <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=DHusKacAAAAJ&hl=en">human impacts on wild places</a>, we believe it’s important to know that you can have major effects on wildlife just by being nearby. </p>
<p>In a <a href="https://doi.org/10.3897/natureconservation.44.63270">recent review</a> of hundreds of studies covering many species, we found that the presence of humans can alter wild animal and bird behavior patterns at much greater distances than most people may think. Small mammals and birds may change their behavior when hikers or birders come within 300 feet (100 meters) – the length of a football field. Large birds like eagles and hawks can be affected when humans are over 1,300 feet (400 meters) away – roughly a quarter of a mile. And large mammals like elk and moose can be affected by humans up to 3,300 feet (1,000 meters) away – more than half a mile. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/409530/original/file-20210702-19-142k85b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Elk viewed over a hiker's shoulder." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/409530/original/file-20210702-19-142k85b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/409530/original/file-20210702-19-142k85b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409530/original/file-20210702-19-142k85b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409530/original/file-20210702-19-142k85b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=900&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409530/original/file-20210702-19-142k85b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409530/original/file-20210702-19-142k85b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/409530/original/file-20210702-19-142k85b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1131&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A hiker about 75 feet from a bull elk in Yellowstone National Park.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/YFPp56">Jacob W. Frank, NPS/Flickr</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Many recent studies and reports have shown that the world is facing a <a href="https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/blog/2019/05/nature-decline-unprecedented-report/">biodiversity crisis</a>. Over the past 50 years, Earth has lost so many species that many scientists believe the planet is experiencing its <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-is-a-mass-extinction-and-are-we-in-one-now-122535">sixth mass extinction</a> – due mainly to human activities. </p>
<p>Protected areas, from local open spaces to national parks, are vital for conserving plants and animals. They also are places where people like to spend time in nature. We believe that everyone who uses the outdoors should understand and respect this balance between outdoor recreation, sustainable use and conservation. </p>
<h2>How human presence affects wildlife</h2>
<p>Pandemic lockdowns in 2020 confined many people indoors – and wildlife responded. In Istanbul, <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-52459487">dolphins ventured much closer to shore than usual</a>. <a href="https://www.businessinsider.co.za/penguins-roads-2020-4">Penguins explored quiet South African Streets</a>. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/gallery/2021/jan/22/israels-ibex-make-the-most-of-lockdown-in-pictures">Nubian ibex grazed on Israeli playgrounds</a>. The fact that animals moved so freely without people present shows how wild species change their behavior in response to human activities.</p>
<p>Decades of research have shown that outdoor recreation, whether it’s hiking, cross-country skiing or riding all-terrain vehicles, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0167259">has negative effects on wildlife</a>. The most obvious signs are behavioral changes: Animals may flee from nearby people, decrease the time they feed and abandon nests or dens.</p>
<p>Other effects are harder to see, but can have serious consequences for animals’ health and survival. Wild animals that detect humans can experience physiological changes, such as increased heart rates and elevated levels of stress hormones. </p>
<p>And humans’ outdoor activities can degrade habitat that wild species depend on for food, shelter and reproduction. <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/07/humans-predators-mountain-lions-landscape-of-fear/594187/">Human voices</a>, <a href="https://www.oregonmetro.gov/sites/default/files/2017/09/28/impacts-of-dogs-on-wildlife-water-quality-science-review.pdf">off-leash dogs</a> and <a href="https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/environment/your-campsite-destroying-nature/">campsite overuse</a> all have harmful effects that make habitat unusable for many wild species.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/D3x3oVKdzhI?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Disturbing shorebirds can cause them to stop eating, stop feeding their young or flee their nests, leaving chicks vulnerable.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Effects of human presence vary for different species</h2>
<p>For our study we examined 330 peer-reviewed articles spanning 38 years to locate thresholds at which recreation activities negatively affected wild animals and birds. The main thresholds we found were related to distances between wildlife and people or trails. But we also found other important factors, including the number of daily park visitors and the decibel levels of people’s conversations.</p>
<p>The studies that we reviewed covered over a dozen different types of motorized and nonmotorized recreation. While it might seem that motorized activities would have a bigger impact, some studies have found that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1755-263X.2008.00019.x">dispersed “quiet” activities, such as day hiking, biking and wildlife viewing</a>, can also affect which wild species will use a protected area. </p>
<p>Put another way, many species may be disturbed by humans nearby, even if those people are not using motorboats or all-terrain vehicles. It’s harder for animals to detect quiet humans, so there’s a better chance that they’ll be surprised by a cross-country skier than a snowmobile, for instance. In addition, some species that have been historically hunted are more likely to recognize – <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2008.06.026">and flee from – a person walking</a> than a person in a motorized vehicle.</p>
<p>Generally, larger animals need more distance, though the relationship is clearer for birds than mammals. We found that for birds, as bird size increased, so did the threshold distance. The smallest birds could tolerate humans within 65 feet (20 meters), while the largest birds had thresholds of roughly 2,000 feet (600 meters). <a href="https://doi.org/10.1590/s1984-46702015000600002">Previous research</a> has found a similar relationship. We did not find that this relationship existed as clearly for mammals.</p>
<p>We found little research on impact thresholds for amphibians and reptiles, such as lizards, frogs, turtles and snakes. A <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.538">growing body of evidence</a> shows that amphibians and reptiles are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biocon.2006.01.001">disturbed</a> and negatively affected by recreation. So far, however, it’s unclear whether those effects reflect mainly the distance to people, the number of visitors or other factors.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/407795/original/file-20210623-26-n3youq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Graphic showing distances at which human presence affects animals' behavior." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/407795/original/file-20210623-26-n3youq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/407795/original/file-20210623-26-n3youq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/407795/original/file-20210623-26-n3youq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/407795/original/file-20210623-26-n3youq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=344&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/407795/original/file-20210623-26-n3youq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/407795/original/file-20210623-26-n3youq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/407795/original/file-20210623-26-n3youq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=432&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Human recreation starts to affect wild creatures’ behavior and physical state at different distances. Small mammals and birds tolerate closer recreation than do larger birds of prey and large mammals.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Sarah Markes</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>How to reduce your impact on wildlife</h2>
<p>While there’s much still to learn, we know enough to identify some simple actions people can take to minimize their impacts on wildlife. First, keep your distance. Although some species or individual animals will become used to human presence at close range, many others won’t. And it can be hard to tell when you are stressing an animal and potentially endangering both it and yourself. </p>
<p>Second, respect closed areas and stay on trails. For example, in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, wildlife managers <a href="https://rootsrated.com/stories/dont-poach-the-powder-campaign-helps-protect-wildlife-in-the-winter">seasonally close some backcountry ski areas</a> to protect critical habitat for bighorn sheep and reduce stress on other species like moose, elk and mule deer. And rangers in Maine’s Acadia National Park <a href="https://www.nps.gov/acad/learn/news/trails-close-for-peregrine-nesting.htm">close several trails annually near peregrine falcon nests</a>. This reduces stress to nesting birds and has <a href="https://www.nps.gov/articles/peregrine-falcons-in-acadia.htm">helped this formerly endangered species recover</a>.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="InstagramEmbed" data-react-props="{"url":"https://www.instagram.com/p/B89vyKwFlsZ","accessToken":"127105130696839|b4b75090c9688d81dfd245afe6052f20"}"></div></p>
<p>Getting involved with educational or volunteer programs is a great way to learn about wildlife and help maintain undisturbed areas. As our research shows, balancing recreation with conservation means opening some areas to human use and keeping others entirely or mostly undisturbed. </p>
<p>As development <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.1500052">fragments wild habitat</a> and climate change forces many species to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1913007117">shift their ranges</a>, movement corridors between protected areas become even more important. Our research suggests that creating recreation-free wildlife corridors of at least 3,300 feet (1,000 meters) wide can enable most species to move between protected areas without disturbance. Seeing wildlife can be part of a fun outdoor experience – but for the animals’ sake, you may need binoculars or a zoom lens for your camera.</p>
<p>[<em>Get our best science, health and technology stories.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/science-editors-picks-71/?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=science-best">Sign up for The Conversation’s science newsletter</a>.]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/162223/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jeremy Dertien receives funding from Sonoma Land Trust</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Courtney Larson received funding from the California Department of Fish and Wildlife.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Sarah Reed receives funding from Sonoma Land Trust. </span></em></p>Outdoor recreation is booming across the US, but research shows that the presence of humans – or the trails they hike and ski on – can have harmful effects on wildlife at less-than-close range.Jeremy Dertien, PhD Candidate in Forestry and Environmental Conservation, Clemson UniversityCourtney Larson, Adjunct Assistant Professor, University of WyomingSarah Reed, Affiliate Faculty in Fish, Wildlife and Conservation Biology, Colorado State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1548162021-03-04T11:06:24Z2021-03-04T11:06:24ZYour favorite fishing stream may be at high risk from climate change – here’s how to tell<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/383623/original/file-20210210-23-1f0u7xv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C5751%2C3811&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Stream temperature affects the survival of fish like salmon and trout.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/fly-fisherwoman-casting-and-fishing-british-colombia-canada-news-photo/1277721026">Peter Adams/Avalon/Universal Images Group via Getty Images</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Many of the streams that people count on for fishing, water and recreation are getting warmer as global temperatures rise. But they aren’t all heating up in the same way.</p>
<p>If communities can figure out where these streams will warm the most, they can plan for the future. That has been difficult to predict in the past, but a new method involving temperature patterns may make it easier. </p>
<p>People have widely assumed that streams fed by substantial amounts of groundwater are more resistant to climate change than those fed mostly by snowmelt or rain. It turns out that this groundwater buffering effect varies quite a bit. The depth of the groundwater affects the stream temperature response to warming, which in turn affects the habitats of fish and other wildlife and plants.</p>
<p>In a study published in March 2021 in the journal <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-21651-0">Nature Communications</a>, my colleagues and I describe a simple, inexpensive method that allows communities to look at the temperature history of a stream compared to local air temperature to gauge the depth of the groundwater feeding into it and, from there, assess its risk as the climate changes. </p>
<h2>Why temperature matters</h2>
<p>While a few degrees of temperature change may not seem like much, the majority of animals living in streams and rivers cannot regulate their own body temperatures, so they move around in the environment to find suitable habitats. Many have adapted over time to a narrow range of temperatures. For example, when the waters are warm, especially during hot summer months with low water flow, fish like salmon and trout that live in colder waters must seek out colder water or perish. These ecological effects can have cascading consequences – for wildlife, humans and local economies.</p>
<p>Most streams flow all the time. During times without rainfall, water in streams mostly comes from below ground. In fact, groundwater is thought to make up an average of <a href="https://pubs.usgs.gov/circ/circ1139/">52% of surface water flow across the United States</a>. </p>
<p>Because groundwater is typically colder than surface water in summer, the groundwater flowing into streams can buffer the overall stream temperature from climate warming. However, deeper groundwater tends to have more stable temperatures than groundwater closer to the surface.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Map from the study" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386012/original/file-20210224-17-1vbwuqv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/386012/original/file-20210224-17-1vbwuqv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386012/original/file-20210224-17-1vbwuqv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386012/original/file-20210224-17-1vbwuqv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=338&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386012/original/file-20210224-17-1vbwuqv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386012/original/file-20210224-17-1vbwuqv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/386012/original/file-20210224-17-1vbwuqv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=425&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A new technique can classify whether the water flowing into streams is primarily from groundwater and whether that groundwater is from shallow or deep sources.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Danielle Hare</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Previous studies have shown that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1745-6584.2005.00052.x">groundwater temperature</a> is tied to the depth that it travels. <a href="https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-2469-2015">Shallow groundwater is more readily influenced by climate variability</a> because it’s close to the land surface. <a href="http://doi.org/10.5194/hess-23-1393-2019">It is also more susceptible to drying,</a> which can reduce, or even disconnect, the shallow groundwater flow from the stream.</p>
<p>Our research builds on these observations. We found that streams with shallow groundwater sources are likely to be warming as much as streams fed mostly by snowmelt and rain, and at similar rates.</p>
<h2>Figuring out a stream’s risk</h2>
<p>The main method currently used to evaluate if streams are fed by groundwater at large scales cannot differentiate between a stream that relies on shallow groundwater and one fed by deep groundwater. That means that plans for how to manage the effects of climate change are likely not accounting for these important differences. Other studies have also shown that <a href="https://doi.org/10.5194/hess-19-2469-2015">changes to the land</a>, such as from wildfires, snow pack changes and deforestation, influence shallow groundwater temperature more than deep groundwater temperature. </p>
<p>Looking at temperature patterns can provide more information about the risks streams might face. </p>
<p>We found that when the temperature of a stream follows the same warming and cooling pattern as the air temperature, with a time lag of about 10-40 days, that stream is likely being fed by shallow groundwater. Deeper groundwater stays cooler in the summer and the stream’s temperature doesn’t fluctuate as much.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="Chart of stream water and air temperature" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/383941/original/file-20210212-15-1rjqrhl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/383941/original/file-20210212-15-1rjqrhl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=365&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/383941/original/file-20210212-15-1rjqrhl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=365&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/383941/original/file-20210212-15-1rjqrhl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=365&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/383941/original/file-20210212-15-1rjqrhl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=458&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/383941/original/file-20210212-15-1rjqrhl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=458&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/383941/original/file-20210212-15-1rjqrhl.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=458&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">When stream water temperature follows the same warming pattern as local air temperature, but with a lag of about 10 to 40 days, it’s a sign that the stream is fed by shallow groundwater.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Danielle Hare</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>We analyzed the water and air temperature at 1,424 sites along streams across the United States and found that approximately 40% of the streams were strongly influenced by groundwater. Of those, we found that half were fed predominantly by shallow groundwater, which was much higher than expected. Comparing this method’s results <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.04.344">against field and modeling data</a> in smaller studies has shown its rigor.</p>
<p>[<em>Understand new developments in science, health and technology, each week.</em> <a href="https://memberservices.theconversation.com/newsletters/?nl=science&source=science-understand">Subscribe to The Conversation’s science newsletter</a>.]</p>
<p>Because this method requires only stream and air temperature data, landowners and local communities can gather the data at little cost, or it may already be available. Once that information is known, they can plan for future changes and take steps to protect the water quality in streams that are most likely to provide long-term stability.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/154816/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Danielle Hare receives funding from the National Science Foundation. </span></em></p>Groundwater was once thought to buffer streams from warming, but an inexpensive new technique shows streams fed by shallow groundwater may be just as susceptible as those without.Danielle Hare, Hydrogeologist, Graduate Research Assistant, University of ConnecticutLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1443442021-01-05T21:57:09Z2021-01-05T21:57:09ZReopen recreation spaces after COVID-19 for the good of the public, not the individual<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/373514/original/file-20201208-17-say5tq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C44%2C5991%2C3943&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Physical distancing sign on the entrance to Trinity Bellwoods Park in Toronto on April 24, 2020.
</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>As we struggle through various phases of COVID-19 restrictions, we are all looking towards what will be a long and tentative process of reopening. Yet the lessons from our first reopening strategies last spring make it clear that we have a number of very important questions arising about <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/01490400.2020.1774827">leisure, recreation and public space</a>.</p>
<p>Taking fishing, for example. In April 2020, a California Fish and Game Commission <a href="https://www.sacbee.com/sports/outdoors/hunting-fishing/article241886476.html">virtual meeting was interrupted</a> by over 500 participants concerned about a rumoured (and untrue) closure of the sport fishing season (“Make Fishing Great Again!” was one of their slogans). </p>
<p>A couple of months later and further up the Pacific Coast in British Columbia, a private fishing lodge on Haida Gwaii <a href="https://www.aptnnews.ca/national-news/haida-gwaii-worries-about-covid-19-as-fishing-lodge-reopens/">ignored the ban on non-residents issued by the Council of the Haida Nation</a> and opened up its remote resort to paying customers. While the supposedly innocent activity of fishing has long been a site of conflict and negotiation (one especially <a href="https://utorontopress.com/ca/fish-law-and-colonialism-3">connected to colonialism</a>), COVID-19 is part of a new front in those conflicts.</p>
<h2>Leisure in the pandemic</h2>
<p>Indeed, leisure has been a central part of the COVID-19 discussion and experience so far. Here, in Manitoba, one of the first actions taken in the aftermath of our first COVID-19 case was to close community recreation centres, pools and libraries. While COVID-19 has handed out a host of new stresses on our lives, including sickness, grieving, isolation, loss of income and overwork, it has also meant a substantial change in our free-time patterns. And much like the broader experience of the pandemic, leisure life has been a <a href="https://www.azuremagazine.com/article/park-politics-inequality-and-public-space-during-covid-19/">very polarized experience</a> shaped by layers of privilege and a little random luck. </p>
<p>Even the closure of recreation services has an uneven impact, as those with access to private pools and gyms — and now backyard skating rinks — feel this less than others. When the services were allowed to reopen in the spring, it was the fee-for-service facilities that opened first. And of course, regulations are <a href="https://www.thestar.com/opinion/2020/05/24/mostly-white-covidiots-at-trinity-bellwoods-think-the-rules-dont-apply-to-them-theyre-right.html">unevenly applied between communities</a>, such that public space is implicitly a space for white wealthy citizens.</p>
<p>Beyond access to facilities, we are also finding that many individual leisure activities run up against a set of rules designed for collective well-being. On both sides there are convincing and evidence-based rationales: In the increasing anxiety of COVID-19 lockdowns, being able to safely get outside will <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-09/in-a-pandemic-the-parks-are-keeping-us-alive">help alleviate mental and physical health issues</a>. </p>
<p>Yet while transmission is less likely outdoors, our urban spaces can’t always handle everyone going out at the same time. More acutely, rural spaces, such as First Nations territories on the B.C. coast, can’t handle an influx of urban dwellers and the possibility of transmission.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/do-you-have-a-right-to-go-to-the-cottage-during-the-coronavirus-pandemic-138702">Do you have a right to go to the cottage during the coronavirus pandemic?</a>
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</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Economic ecosystem</h2>
<p>On the surface, these two contrary desires are possible to resolve in acceptable ways. However, it’s not always that easy. Working against the rational resolution of these two poles of the argument is the importance of the leisure industry to the economy and the overwhelming individualistic nature of our leisure pursuits.</p>
<p>Leisure activities, especially ones that we participate in individually or in small groups, are an easy option for governments looking to open up small sectors of the economy. This is especially the case for regions that rely heavily on the influx of money from tourism. </p>
<p>My province has predicted <a href="https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/travel-tourism-manitoba-covid-19-economic-impact-1.5557721">a $900-million shortfall</a> because of the loss of international tourism. Part of the solution for Manitoba has been to focus on <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/7176833/manitoba-premier-approves-tourists-despite-coronavirus/">encouraging regional travel</a> instead of international tourism. Yet the individualistic nature of our leisure habits can turn this into a <a href="https://www.britannica.com/science/tragedy-of-the-commons">tragedy of the commons</a>.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/vAdzux2scWE?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">At one point during the pandemic, Travel Manitoba promoted regional tourism.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>While it might be easy to chalk up this dilemma to our selfish desires, we also need to recognize the culture of freedom that is ingrained in our <a href="https://www.dukeupress.edu/romancing-the-wild">outdoor recreation</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/11745398.2016.1206723">leisure culture</a>. </p>
<p>In North America, individual accomplishments in nature are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1215/9780822384656-006">markers of privilege and individual freedom</a>. This kind of frontier mentality views the urban world as having a stranglehold on our desires and ability to fully express ourselves. Only in nature, the refrain goes, can we find our true self. This culture of freedom is also linked to <a href="https://www.ubcpress.ca/canoe-nation">ideals of whiteness that reduce the possibility for equitable access to wilderness public space</a>.</p>
<h2>The pursuit of nature</h2>
<p>It is worth remembering that this culture of individualism was often promoted not only as a way to gain individual pleasure and satisfaction, but also as part of a political movement. Early conservationists played up nature as a way to provide individual health promotion and as a kind of moral duty in the face of a changing society — think here of naturalists Henry David Thoreau and John Muir as well as <a href="https://www.canadahistory.ca/sections/documents/arts/Ascetic%20in%20a%20Canoe.html">Pierre Elliott Trudeau</a>.</p>
<p>Urban recreational habits, like <a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1177/1474474013491927">the popularity of running</a> or <a href="https://doi.org/10.1068/a3237">the introduction of public playgrounds</a>, similarly have moral roots. What is important to note here is that the dominant, white, individualistic and consumer-based nature of our recreational activities has been produced in this way — it isn’t just a part of human nature.</p>
<p>It is important, then, to recognize that these decisions about what kinds of activities we like, or privilege, are shaped not just by our individual preferences, but by particular ways of looking at what public space should be. These ideas about public space, whether they are in the city or in the country, are built upon our ideas about race and safety. </p>
<p>Held behind the promotion of these individual recreational trends, and the new guidelines for staying safe in the time of COVID-19, are beliefs about how our access to the public world around us should be governed. It is common to recognize the potential that this pandemic has for <a href="https://www.ft.com/content/10d8f5e8-74eb-11ea-95fe-fcd274e920ca">creating lasting change</a>, and so it is worthwhile to take this time to rethink our use of public space. </p>
<p>One step in that journey is to recognize how we came to prioritize certain individual freedoms over social safety and public good, and the impact those cultural ideals has on equitable access to public space.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/144344/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bruce Erickson receives funding from The Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. </span></em></p>The provision of recreational activities and access to public space have always been underpinned by moral and class values. Planning the post-pandemic reopening should address these inequities.Bruce Erickson, Assistant Professor of Human Geography, University of ManitobaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1439562020-08-18T16:49:51Z2020-08-18T16:49:51ZParents of online gamers need to think twice before labelling the hobby a ‘waste of time’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/352578/original/file-20200812-20-21wa9k.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=8%2C16%2C5381%2C3571&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Playing video games can be a fun and healthy way to connect with other people and cope with stress.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Another day, another critic of online gaming. This time, it is one of the most well known faces, or voices, in popular culture today.</p>
<p>Joe Rogan, host of the <a href="https://www.podcastinsights.com/top-us-podcasts/">third most popular podcast</a> in the world called <em>The Joe Rogan Experience (JRE)</em>, recently called video games a “waste of time.” </p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"1287374826999615488"}"></div></p>
<p>Instead of gaming, Rogan advocates for one to learn a sport such as jiu jitsu, win competitions and then become a coach by teaching other students and make a nice living for one’s self.</p>
<p>This is a dangerous message to be spreading. Especially when on YouTube alone, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCzQUP1qoWDoEbmsQxvdjxgQ">Rogan has more than nine million subscribers</a>, and <a href="https://www.theverge.com/2020/5/19/21263927/joe-rogan-spotify-experience-exclusive-content-episodes-youtube">his podcast has over 190 million monthly downloads</a>. The <em>JRE</em> podcast is so popular, that Spotify will be paying Rogan $100 million dollars over a multi-year contract to <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/johnkoetsier/2020/05/19/joe-rogan-moves-podcast-with-286-million-fans-to-spotify-drops-apple-youtube-other-platforms/#7c10f4662a23">move his podcast exclusively to their platform</a>.</p>
<p>As an online gaming scholar, I have already discussed the growing popularity of the gaming industry, and the possible avenues for success if one seriously wishes to pursue gaming as an occupation. In addition, I have touched on the social aspects of gaming and the importance of staying connected in an increasingly online world. As an avid gamer and researcher, I feel the need to make a statement to anyone who discourages a gamer in their life: gaming is not a waste of time.</p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/critics-who-say-online-gaming-is-just-a-game-completely-miss-the-point-132845">Critics who say online gaming is 'just a game' completely miss the point</a>
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</em>
</p>
<hr>
<h2>Gaming addictions</h2>
<p>When new forms of media are introduced, there is initial distrust <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/1369118032000163240">out of concern that the new medium might be displacing a more ‘constructive’ activity</a>. Activities like jiu jitsu, as Rogan argued. And he’s not the only one stoking fears about gaming.</p>
<p>U.S. President Donald Trump has suggested that video games are connected to violence, however, <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/lisettevoytko/2019/08/05/trump-blames-video-games-for-shootings-but-research-doesnt-support-that/#5334836511dc">research does not seem to support that claim</a>. </p>
<p>The World Health Organization has also <a href="https://www.who.int/news-room/q-a-detail/gaming-disorder">classified gaming disorder as a behavioural addiction</a>. While research has shown this is a more prevalent issue, we must remember the old expression: everything in moderation.</p>
<p>Rogan himself has <a href="https://gamerant.com/joe-rogan-video-game-addiction/">personally struggled with video game addiction</a>. While game addiction might only be seen in <a href="https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1360-0443.2010.03104.x">small populations</a>, it is important to note the negative possibilities involved with online gaming.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/353021/original/file-20200815-22-9tp1c9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Tired-looking man on a couch holding a game controller" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/353021/original/file-20200815-22-9tp1c9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/353021/original/file-20200815-22-9tp1c9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/353021/original/file-20200815-22-9tp1c9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/353021/original/file-20200815-22-9tp1c9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/353021/original/file-20200815-22-9tp1c9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/353021/original/file-20200815-22-9tp1c9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/353021/original/file-20200815-22-9tp1c9.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Addiction is a growing concern but rather than prevent children from playing video games, parents should pay attention to how, when and why their children play games.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Advice for parents</h2>
<p>It is easy to see why video games are perceived as a problem. Especially if you are a parent of a young gamer who may believe that their child is spending more time gaming online than they are completing their homework.
Here is a bit of advice for those uncomfortable with the increasingly popular medium of online video games.</p>
<p><strong>1. Embrace them</strong></p>
<p>Online gaming is not a fad — its popularity continues to rise with new games and platforms. Instead of dismissing them as a waste of time for your kids, embrace online gaming. Ask your children why gaming is so important to them. Try to understand why they want to spend their time playing games, rather than another hobby. </p>
<p>They might say it is a social outlet, a time to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1145/1180875.1180898">connect with their friends and make new ones</a>. They might say it is an <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2019/10/14/its-my-escape-how-video-games-help-people-cope-with-disabilities/">escape from reality</a> or a way to relieve <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0018720817715360">stress</a>. It is time to be <a href="https://ideas.ted.com/your-kids-gaming-time-isnt-wasted-time-heres-why/">curious rather than critical</a>.</p>
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Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/social-video-games-to-play-during-the-coronavirus-quarantine-134880">Social video games to play during the coronavirus quarantine</a>
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</em>
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<p><strong>2. Get involved</strong></p>
<p>If your child is comfortable with the idea, get involved with their gaming. Read about the games they play. Watch YouTube videos or Twitch streams to understand more about the gameplay. Ask your child if you can watch them play, or even play with them! Video games are not only fun to play, but playing with your children can help teach them <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/jordanshapiro/2013/12/04/research-says-parents-and-kids-should-play-video-games-together/#2410ab9d4892">problem solving, literacy and science</a>. </p>
<p>Online gaming is unfortunately <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2019/02/26/racism-misogyny-death-threats-why-cant-booming-video-game-industry-curb-toxicity/">a toxic space</a> despite many positive players and environments. If you find your child is contributing to or being affected by the toxic space, you may be able to have a positive impact on the community by having a conversation with them. While this may seem like a reason to not have your children involved with online gaming, it is important to understand the space. See who they interact with and what is being said online. If you do not like what you see or hear, talk to them about it. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/353020/original/file-20200815-20-n9v9k6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Father and daughter playing a video game" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/353020/original/file-20200815-20-n9v9k6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/353020/original/file-20200815-20-n9v9k6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/353020/original/file-20200815-20-n9v9k6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/353020/original/file-20200815-20-n9v9k6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/353020/original/file-20200815-20-n9v9k6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/353020/original/file-20200815-20-n9v9k6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/353020/original/file-20200815-20-n9v9k6.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Playing video games with your child is a way to understand how they spend their time.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">(Shutterstock)</span></span>
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<p><strong>3. Stop equating time with money and success</strong></p>
<p>Who is to say that gaming is a waste of time, and what are we comparing it to? As stated above, there are many reasons why gaming is not a waste of time. While you can make money gaming, it is easy to argue that only the top one per cent will do so. This is no different than other “constructive activities”; in hockey, for example there is <a href="https://www.huffpost.com/entry/how-hard-is-it-to-make-it_b_5803634">less than a one per cent chance</a> that your child will make it to the National Hockey League. Hobbies and leisure pursuits do not need to be valued on financial success.</p>
<p>If you are a worried parent who believes their child may be addicted to video games, take a step back. Learn more about the environment, understand their motivations and ensure their responsibilities are completed before dismissing their time playing games. Chances are, your kids are just having fun.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/143956/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Joe Todd does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Joe Rogan, a popular podcast host, derided gaming as a waste of time. For parents who are worried that this is true, understanding their children’s motivation can allay their concerns.Joe Todd, PhD Student in Recreation and Leisure Studies, University of WaterlooLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1385122020-06-05T12:07:14Z2020-06-05T12:07:14ZSummer visitors to American parks choose safety first over freedom to roam<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/335235/original/file-20200514-77251-qf9kqu.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=9%2C192%2C3277%2C2015&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Utah's Bryce Canyon National Park hosted more than 2.5 million visitors in 2019.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://unsplash.com/photos/gFtJO8ciK90">Anqi Lu/Unsplash</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>In a typical summer, <a href="https://irma.nps.gov/Datastore/DownloadFile/637876">millions of Americans</a> head outdoors to national parks, hiking trails and rivers across the U.S. This summer, because of COVID-19 precautions, getting outdoors will be different, although how different isn’t certain.</p>
<p>My colleagues and I are part of a <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/lab/Protected-Areas-Research-Collaborative-PARC-Peter-Newman">research team</a> at Pennsylvania State University that studies <a href="https://hhd.psu.edu/rptm">outdoor recreation and park management</a>. Our team recently conducted a national survey of more 1,000 outdoor enthusiasts across 47 states with the <a href="https://lnt.org/research-resources/leave-no-trace-covid-19-research/">Leave No Trace</a> Center for Outdoor Ethics. </p>
<p><a href="https://osf.io/fy8s6/">The survey</a> asked several key questions that included how those who use parks were considering a return to outdoor recreation this summer and how parks might be managed for COVID-19 to ensure the safety and security of park users. </p>
<p>The responses to the survey suggested that this summer, we may be entering a new era of park management. Outdoor recreationists not only say they want stricter enforcement of rules to keep people safe but that they welcome new guidelines and even limits to their freedoms so that all visitors can experience the benefits of nature without compromising their health due to COVID-19.</p>
<h2>‘Wildness is a necessity’</h2>
<p>The renowned naturalist John Muir wrote that “thousands of tired, nerve-shaken, over-civilized people are beginning to find out that going to the mountains is going home; that wildness is a necessity; and that mountain parks and reservations are useful not only as fountains of timber and irrigating rivers, but as fountains of life.” The world has changed immensely since <a href="https://vault.sierraclub.org/john_muir_exhibit/writings/our_national_parks/chapter_1.aspx">he wrote this in 1901</a>. </p>
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<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/cQcmfoJIGJU?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">There are so many reasons why so many people visit America’s national parks.</span></figcaption>
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<p>People, <a href="https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/3wx5a">now more than ever</a>, seek <a href="https://youtu.be/l1onR8OVL6o">the benefits of nature</a> regardless of whether they live in rural Colorado or Manhattan. Experiencing the <a href="http://www.georgewright.org/353manning.pdf">sights and sounds of nature</a> has long been thought to make people feel better. The desire to seek out those experiences is, perhaps, <a href="https://doi.org/10.5822/978-1-61091-036-1_15">even biologically driven</a>. Today, there is a <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/263806493_What_is_the_value_and_implications_of_viewing_park_resources_as_health_resources">growing body of scientific evidence</a> that shows the positive links between exposure to the natural world and humans’ <a href="https://doi.org/10.18666/JPRA-2016-V34-I3-6893">cognitive</a>, <a href="https://doi.org/10.2979/rptph.1.1.07">physiological</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jort.2019.100272">social</a> well-being. </p>
<h2>Balancing recreation and risk</h2>
<p>Our survey, carried out in April and May, examined how outdoor recreation behaviors across all types of parks and protected areas may be changing in response to the pandemic and with it, expectations of park management.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336169/original/file-20200519-152315-1trip89.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336169/original/file-20200519-152315-1trip89.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336169/original/file-20200519-152315-1trip89.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336169/original/file-20200519-152315-1trip89.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336169/original/file-20200519-152315-1trip89.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336169/original/file-20200519-152315-1trip89.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=536&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336169/original/file-20200519-152315-1trip89.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=536&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336169/original/file-20200519-152315-1trip89.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=536&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Great Chimney Rock at Acadia National Park.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Maine-Daily-Life/3a7da3973c284323b4c1b7aa2bf59b0b/14/0">AP Photo/Robert F. Bukaty</a></span>
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</figure>
<p>Through their online list serve, individuals associated with the <a href="https://lnt.org/research-resources/leave-no-trace-covid-19-research/">Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics</a> served as potential respondents for this research. This community consists largely of outdoor enthusiasts who are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00222216.2011.11950226">highly dependent on outdoor recreation</a> as a form of leisure. More than 1,800 surveys were completed in two phases and consisted of questions related to behavioral changes, making decisions about recreation and expectations for park management.</p>
<p>Findings from our research, “<a href="https://osf.io/fy8s6/">Evaluating the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic to outdoor recreation and predicting long-term trends</a>,” suggest that not only are recreational behaviors shifting and affecting certain demographics more than others, but expectations of park management have changed, too. Our survey reported that, in general, people are yearning to get back outside. </p>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336138/original/file-20200519-152315-1w7bpct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336138/original/file-20200519-152315-1w7bpct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336138/original/file-20200519-152315-1w7bpct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336138/original/file-20200519-152315-1w7bpct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336138/original/file-20200519-152315-1w7bpct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336138/original/file-20200519-152315-1w7bpct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336138/original/file-20200519-152315-1w7bpct.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption"></span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Travel-Peaceful-Yosemite/f9331fa9e9b549d493ec6ec50cba8ef3/46/0">AP Photo/Amanda Lee Myers</a></span>
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<p>Nearly 85% of those surveyed reported that they are very to extremely likely to return to public lands as soon as restrictions ease. The survey also reported that outdoor enthusiasts support increased preventive health measures in the parks including limits on visitor capacities and strict social distancing. </p>
<p>Urban dwellers, who have faced the most barriers to accessing parks, have, on average, significantly decreased their frequency of outdoor recreation by more than three days per week, while back-country travel has been reduced by nearly three miles. This is likely due to heightened restrictions on travel outside the home and increased park closures <a href="https://ce.naco.org/?dset=COVID-19&ind=Emergency%20Declaration%20Types">in and around major cities</a>. </p>
<p>As a result, the U.S. may be in for an <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/14616688.2020.1759131">overcorrection or rebound</a> in activity once cities and states begin to relax safer-at-home orders and open their park systems. It may be that urban dwellers return to their favorite activities and recreation areas at even higher rates than before the pandemic. </p>
<p>How can we ensure a safe, healthy experience in our parks while balancing the health risks of a pandemic? <a href="https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=umn.31951d02960007y&view=1up&seq=25">Not without sacrifice</a>. </p>
<h2>Playing by new rules</h2>
<p>By definition, an outdoor enthusiast appreciates <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00222216.1972.11970069">the lack of constraints to explore the natural world</a>. Outdoor enthusiasts are normally <a href="https://youtu.be/0EfTy5f3SJQ">not keen on limiting their freedom</a> to roam as they please. Mandatory permit systems and capacity limits at popular recreation sites <a href="https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=uiug.30112020130834&view=1up&seq=413">have long been the bane of the outdoor adventurer</a>. Our research shows that COVID-19 has <a href="https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/dghba">changed this perspective</a>, at least for the time being. </p>
<p><a href="https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/dghba">Our research</a> shows that outdoor enthusiasts like hikers, canoeists, rock climbers and mountain bikers are largely supportive of park and protected area agencies like the National Park Service or Bureau of Land Management keeping greater control over visitor volume on public lands and trails. More than 75% either completely or strongly agreed that parks should implement capacity limits in response to COVID-19.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336160/original/file-20200519-152292-17rx03o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336160/original/file-20200519-152292-17rx03o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/336160/original/file-20200519-152292-17rx03o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=904&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336160/original/file-20200519-152292-17rx03o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=904&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336160/original/file-20200519-152292-17rx03o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=904&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336160/original/file-20200519-152292-17rx03o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1136&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336160/original/file-20200519-152292-17rx03o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1136&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/336160/original/file-20200519-152292-17rx03o.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1136&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">More than 3.4 million people visited Acadia National Park last year, earning it the rank of seventh most visited national park in the U.S.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Associated-Press-Domestic-News-Maine-United-Sta-/ca2f8fd3dee6da11af9f0014c2589dfb/149/0">AP Photo/Christina Hinke</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These increased rules, which may include limiting usage and allowing people to enter a trail or park at timed entry allotments, are designed to keep people safe and allow for physical distancing. </p>
<p>Our survey demonstrated that over 95% of outdoor enthusiasts also want park and protected area staff to use personal protective equipment such as masks, encourage all visitors to wear masks and provide visitors with sanitary amenities like hand sanitizer. Those who perceive themselves as being at higher risk of serious illness as a result of COVID-19 are significantly more supportive of heavier restrictions and increased safety measures.</p>
<p>Our research suggests that <a href="https://osf.io/preprints/socarxiv/prnz9/">people will be guided</a> by two things this summer when deciding whether or not to visit parks. One, the importance of their physical and mental well-being as a result of outdoor recreation. And two, guidance from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the World Health Organization and federal and state agencies. Above all, outdoor enthusiasts are eager to get back outside and do the things they love, safely. </p>
<p>[<em>Get facts about coronavirus and the latest research.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=upper-coronavirus-facts">Sign up for The Conversation’s newsletter.</a>]</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/138512/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>B. Derrick Taff receives funding for research from the Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics, the partnering non-profit organization on this research, through his academic appointment at Pennsylvania State University. He is affiliated with the Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics as a dues-paying member, and as a "Master Educator". </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Peter Newman receives funding from the National Park Service.
Peter Newman is a dues paying member of the Leave No Trace Center for Outdoor Ethics.</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>William L. Rice does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A new survey finds that Americans are willing to accept limits on visitors to public lands to reduce crowds, and want staff and visitors to wear masks.B. Derrick Taff, Assistant Professor, Recreation, Park and Tourism Management, Professor-in-Charge of Graduate Studies, Penn StateLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1195862019-07-09T11:23:25Z2019-07-09T11:23:25ZThe forgotten history of segregated swimming pools and amusement parks<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/282884/original/file-20190705-51284-qnnnb4.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">When a group of white and African American integrationists entered a St. Augustine, Fla. segregated hotel pool in 1964, the hotel manager poured acid into it.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Watchf-Associated-Press-Domestic-News-Florida-United-States-APHS126999-Civil-Rights-Florida-1964/44f1deef9c3f4d3da98611e9f82e5673/5/0">AP Photo</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Summers often bring a wave of childhood memories: lounging poolside, trips to the local amusement park, languid, steamy days at the beach. </p>
<p>These nostalgic recollections, however, aren’t held by all Americans. </p>
<p>Municipal swimming pools and <a href="http://www.napha.org/LibraryResources/FactsFigures/GreatMoments/tabid/69/Default.aspx#paging:currentPage=0">urban amusement parks flourished</a> in the 20th century. But too often, their success was based on the exclusion of African Americans.</p>
<p>As a social historian who has <a href="http://www.upenn.edu/pennpress/book/15035.html">written a book on segregated recreation</a>, I have found that the history of recreational segregation is a largely forgotten one. But it has had a lasting significance on modern race relations. </p>
<p><a href="https://www.uncpress.org/book/9780807871270/contested-waters/">Swimming pools</a> and <a href="https://www.uncpress.org/book/9781469628721/the-land-was-ours/">beaches</a> were among the most segregated and fought over public spaces in the North and the South.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/73675/making-whiteness-by-grace-elizabeth-hale/9780679776208/">White stereotypes of blacks as diseased and sexually threatening</a> served as the foundation for this segregation. City leaders justifying segregation also pointed to <a href="https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520257474/mean-streets">fears of fights breaking out if whites and blacks mingled</a>. Racial separation for them equaled racial peace. </p>
<p>These fears were underscored when white teenagers attacked black swimmers after activists or city officials opened public pools to blacks. For example, whites threw nails at the bottom of pools in Cincinnati, poured bleach and acid in pools with black bathers in St. Augustine, Florida, and beat them up in Philadelphia. In my book, I describe how in the late 1940s there were major swimming pool riots in St. Louis, Baltimore, Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles.</p>
<h2>Exclusion based on ‘safety’</h2>
<p>Despite civil rights statutes in many states, the law did not come to African Americans’ aid. In Charlotte, North Carolina, for example, the chairman of the Charlotte Park and Recreation Commission in 1960 <a href="https://www.loc.gov/loc/lcib/1003/collection.html">admitted that “all people have a right under law to use all public facilitates including swimming pools.”</a> But he went on to point out that “of all public facilities, swimming pools put the tolerance of the white people to the test.” </p>
<p>His conclusion: “Public order is more important than rights of Negroes to use public facilities.” In practice, black swimmers were not admitted to pools if the managers felt “disorder will result.” Disorder and order defined accessibility, not the law. </p>
<p>Fears of disorder also justified segregation at amusement parks, which were built at the end of trolley or ferry lines beginning in 1890. This was particularly true at park swimming pools, dance halls and roller-skating rinks, which were common facilities within parks. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/282888/original/file-20190705-51253-1qxeoqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/282888/original/file-20190705-51253-1qxeoqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/282888/original/file-20190705-51253-1qxeoqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/282888/original/file-20190705-51253-1qxeoqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/282888/original/file-20190705-51253-1qxeoqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/282888/original/file-20190705-51253-1qxeoqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/282888/original/file-20190705-51253-1qxeoqa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Surrounded by a group of white youths, an unidentified black man grimaces as a policeman tries to halt an attack on him in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1949.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Associated-Press-Domestic-News-Missouri-United-/f1eabf7439e5da11af9f0014c2589dfb/1/0">AP Photo</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These spaces provoked the most <a href="http://tupress.temple.edu/book/0701">intense fears</a> of racial mixing among young men and women. Scantily clad bathers flirting and playing raised the specter of interracial sex and some feared for young white women’s safety. </p>
<p>Some white owners and customers <a href="https://us.macmillan.com/books/9780374523145">believed that recreation</a> only could be kept virtuous and safe by excluding African Americans and promoting a sanitized and harmonious vision of white leisure. However, my work shows that these restrictions simply perpetuated racial stereotypes and inequality.</p>
<p>This recreational segregation had a heartbreaking impact on African American children. For example, in his 1963 <a href="https://www.africa.upenn.edu/Articles_Gen/Letter_Birmingham.html">“Letter from Birmingham Jail,”</a> Martin Luther King Jr. described the tears in his daughter’s eyes when “she is told that Funtown is closed to colored children.”</p>
<h2>Protests at pools</h2>
<p>Major civil rights campaigns targeted amusement park segregation, most notably at <a href="https://www.baltimoresun.com/maryland/baltimore-county/bs-md-co-gwynn-oak-park-20130707-story.html">Gwynn Oak Park in Baltimore</a> and <a href="https://www.nps.gov/glec/learn/historyculture/summer-of-change.htm">Glen Echo Park</a> outside of Washington, D.C. And other parks, such as <a href="https://www.courier-journal.com/story/opinion/contributors/2014/06/28/struggle-humanequality/11542217/">Fontaine Ferry in Louisville</a>, were sites of major racial clashes when African Americans sought entrance. </p>
<p>By the early 1970s, most of America’s urban amusement parks like Cleveland’s Euclid Beach and Chicago’s Riverview were closed for good. Some white consumers perceived the <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/The_American_amusement_park_industry.html?id=0ZgkAQAAIAAJ">newly integrated parks as unsafe</a> and in turn park owners sold the land for considerable profit. Other urban leisure sites – public swimming pools, bowling alleys and roller-skating rinks – also closed down as <a href="https://press.princeton.edu/titles/8043.html">white consumers fled cities for the suburbs</a>. </p>
<p>The increase of gated communities and homeowners associations, what the political scientist <a href="https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300066388/privatopia">Evan McKenzie</a> calls “privatopia,” also led to the privatization of recreation. Another factor contributing to the decline of public recreation areas was <a href="https://catalog.hathitrust.org/Record/002784899">the Federal Housing Administration, which in the mid-1960s openly discouraged public ownership of recreational facilities.</a> Instead, they promoted private homeowner associations in planned developments with private pools and tennis courts. </p>
<h2>Lasting legacy</h2>
<p>After the 1964 Civil Rights Act desegregated public accommodations, municipalities followed different strategies intended to keep the racial peace through maintaining segregation. Some simply filled their pools in, leaving more affluent residents the option of putting in backyard pools. Public pools also created membership clubs and began to charge fees, which acted as a barrier to filter out those pool managers felt were “unfit.” </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/282904/original/file-20190705-51312-mdfcsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/282904/original/file-20190705-51312-mdfcsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/282904/original/file-20190705-51312-mdfcsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/282904/original/file-20190705-51312-mdfcsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=461&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/282904/original/file-20190705-51312-mdfcsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=580&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/282904/original/file-20190705-51312-mdfcsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=580&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/282904/original/file-20190705-51312-mdfcsd.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=580&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Passengers on the Parachute Jump ride see throngs of people on the boardwalk and beach at the Coney Island Amusement Park in Brooklyn, N.Y., in 1957.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Watchf-Associated-Press-Domestic-News-New-York-/d91ad1ddf130445c9d2bd4c0e0fe9f7d/15/0">AP Photo</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Over time, cities defunded their recreational facilities, leaving many urban dwellers with little access to pools. Ironically, <a href="https://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/D/bo3640481.html">some blamed African Americans for the decline of urban amusements</a>, disregarding the decades of exclusion and violence they had experienced. </p>
<p>The racial stereotypes that justified swimming segregation are not often openly expressed today. However, we still see their impact on our urban and suburban landscapes. Closed public pools and <a href="https://www.unitedskatesfilm.com/">shuttered skating rinks</a> degrade urban centers.</p>
<p>And there are moments when one hears the direct echo of those earlier struggles. In 2009, for example, the owner of a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/11/us/11pool.html">private swim club in Philadelphia</a> excluded black children attending a Philadelphia day care center, saying they would change the “complexion” of the club.</p>
<p>In 2015 in a <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/09/us/mckinney-tex-pool-party-dispute-leads-to-police-officer-suspension.html">wealthy subdivision outside of Dallas, police targeted black teenagers attending a pool party</a>. </p>
<p>These incidents, and our collective memories, are explicable only in the context of a rarely acknowledged history.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/119586/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Victoria W. Wolcott does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Municipal swimming pools flourished in the 20th century. But too often, their success was based on the exclusion of African Americans.Victoria W. Wolcott, Professor of History, University at BuffaloLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1117682019-02-20T12:12:21Z2019-02-20T12:12:21ZNational parks are beautiful, but austerity and inequality prevent many from enjoying them<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259899/original/file-20190220-148530-1hncdwh.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C9482%2C3051&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Hadrian's Wall in Northumberland National Park, UK.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/hadrians-wall-panorama-sunset-world-heritage-1120289912?src=rRHF49e8s4034i8-sZctiA-1-5">Dave Head/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Spending time in nature is good for you. A person’s access to parks and green, open spaces is important for their health, as <a href="https://thecroydoncitizen.com/politics-society/londons-first-natural-health-service-launches-croydon-using-nature-reduce-demand-nhs/">research from the NHS</a> and the <a href="https://www.hutton.ac.uk/sites/default/files/files/projects/GreenHealth-InformationNote7-Contribution-of-green-and-open-space-in-public-health-and-wellbeing.pdf">OPENSpace research group</a> at Edinburgh and Heriot Watt universities shows. Spending time in parks lowers the risk of cardiovascular disease and asthma, helps address obesity and mitigates mental health issues.</p>
<p>National parks are often considered the best places to escape to and enjoy the benefits of immersion in nature. Occupying whole landscapes in picturesque rural areas, they provide space for hiking, bird watching and mountain biking. Due to their size, they also perform <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/69310/pb13533-national-park-authorities.pdf">critical environmental functions</a> by providing a home to biodiversity and storing atmospheric carbon in vegetation. </p>
<p>But approximately <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2019/feb/04/england-national-parks-out-of-reach-for-poorer-people-study">50% of the UK’s poorest people</a> live over 15 miles from a national park and most people require transport to get to them. For the most disadvantaged people in Britain, <a href="https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/6871/1871208.pdf">who predominantly live in urban areas</a>, these places can seem largely inaccessible. </p>
<p>Within low income communities, <a href="https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20110118110347/http://www.cabe.org.uk/files/urban-green-nation.pdf">opportunities to explore national parks</a> are hindered by inadequate transport options compared to communities of higher socioeconomic standing. The most affluent 20% of wards in the UK also have <a href="https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201617/cmselect/cmcomloc/45/45.pdf">five times the amount of green space</a> than the most deprived 10%. Promoting the value of these green spaces for health and well-being is therefore disingenuous without acknowledging that access isn’t equal.</p>
<p>Local parks, meanwhile, are <a href="https://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/20140605111422/http://www.naturalengland.org.uk/regions/east_of_england/ourwork/gi/accessiblenaturalgreenspacestandardangst.aspx">embedded within neighbourhoods</a> and could ensure that immersion in nature isn’t just a luxury for the rich to enjoy. Typically starting at about two hectares in size and located within a ten-minute walk of residential areas, local parks provide everyday spaces where people can connect with nature.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259904/original/file-20190220-148530-19lrfjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259904/original/file-20190220-148530-19lrfjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259904/original/file-20190220-148530-19lrfjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259904/original/file-20190220-148530-19lrfjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259904/original/file-20190220-148530-19lrfjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259904/original/file-20190220-148530-19lrfjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259904/original/file-20190220-148530-19lrfjl.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Local parks help people come together and enjoy nature in their own neighbourhoods.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/three-happy-children-riding-on-bicycle-214352896?src=LEMrlJGuW87fOj9rVBD5rg-1-1">Spass/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>These are the places where kids play football and ride their bikes and where there is the opportunity for daily contact between people, nature and their communities, all of which is essential for social cohesion. </p>
<p>If people can’t use national parks, perhaps local parks can provide the health and social well-being benefits within the community.</p>
<h2>Not a level playing field</h2>
<p>As a result of austerity, however, <a href="https://extra.shu.ac.uk/ppp-online/wp-content/uploads/2018/12/costs-poor-greenspace-management.pdf">local governments</a> and the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/nov/11/defra-hit-by-largest-budget-cuts-of-any-uk-government-department-analysis-shows">environment sector</a>, which are responsible for managing local parks, are underfunded.</p>
<p>This affects the quality of these parks and means they are less attractive to their communities. Some local authorities are even considering the <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/austerity-local-council-sell-off-parks-public-buildings-funding-save-our-spaces-locality-a8404081.html">sale of their green spaces</a> to limit the annual costs of maintaining them.</p>
<p>National parks generate significant income from tourism. In many cases, this is <a href="https://nationalparks.uk/students/wholooksafternationalparks/costsandspending">their main economic support</a>. Without the opportunity to exploit similar revenue streams or draw from alternative funding sources, issues of access and quality continue to hit local parks more heavily.</p>
<p>“Destination parks”, such as Hyde Park in London or Heaton Park in Manchester, are exceptions – situated in large, urban areas, they enjoy similar opportunities to generate additional revenue as national parks, using events and tourism to generate income. Local parks within poorer communities are unable to attract commercial events with the same frequency or magnitude and are therefore more vulnerable to funding cuts. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259906/original/file-20190220-148545-1bjo92b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/259906/original/file-20190220-148545-1bjo92b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259906/original/file-20190220-148545-1bjo92b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259906/original/file-20190220-148545-1bjo92b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259906/original/file-20190220-148545-1bjo92b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259906/original/file-20190220-148545-1bjo92b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/259906/original/file-20190220-148545-1bjo92b.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Hyde Park and other parks in big cities benefit from large populations and tourism to generate additional revenue.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/london-uk-november-25-2016-people-744252625?src=bugJtXwMyUU-EQLxoZQnzg-1-1">I Wei Huang/Shutterstock</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>All people, regardless of their wealth, should have <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01426397.2017.1390079">access to attractive and functional green spaces</a>. However, the UK government’s announced funding boost of £13m for local parks in February 2019 shows an ignorance of the scale of austerity felt by some parks managers. Many have experienced <a href="https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/cuts-bristols-parks-budget-branded-plan-decay/">budget cuts of up to 90% since 2010</a>. This means lower quality parks with staff redundancies, reduced maintenance and a falling number of council-run activities. </p>
<p>The falling quality of local parks will hit lower income residents hardest – restricting their interaction with nature and their <a href="https://www.designcouncil.org.uk/sites/default/files/asset/document/the-value-of-public-space1.pdf">opportunities to socialise and relax</a>. These are also the people in society who <a href="https://publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201617/cmselect/cmcomloc/45/45.pdf">already have the least access</a> to personal transport, disposable income or affiliations with organisations such as the National Trust. </p>
<p>If the slashing of funding for local parks continues, there may be a corresponding fall in <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-38094186">attachment to nature</a> among poorer communities, as described by psychologist <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/people-in-nature/200901/no-more-nature-deficit-disorder">Richard Louv</a>. Public desire to spend time in nature and concern for its welfare could be lost. </p>
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<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/parklife-britains-beloved-urban-parks-need-a-funding-boost-to-save-them-80645">Parklife: Britain's beloved urban parks need a funding boost to save them</a>
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<p>Properly funding the <a href="https://naturalhealthservice.org.uk/wordpress/the-natural-health-service-consortium/">environmental and health services</a> provided by parks is essential to ensure liveable places for a majority of the British public. Local parks in particular deserve more attention as they are used more frequently by disadvantaged communities and have ongoing benefits for community cohesion. </p>
<p>While national parks offer ecosystem services and the opportunity to escape for a day among natural beauty, if we don’t acknowledge that access to all green spaces is as important as the benefits they can provide, we risk overlooking the inequality that holds many back from enjoying them.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/111768/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ian Mell does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Approximately 50% of the UK’s poorest people live over 15 miles from a national park and most people require transport to get to them.Ian Mell, Senior Lecturer in a Environmental & Landscape Planning, University of ManchesterLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1057922018-12-14T15:33:46Z2018-12-14T15:33:46ZAs hunting declines, efforts grow to broaden the funding base for wildlife conservation<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250563/original/file-20181213-178579-waslni.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Mallard pair at the at John Heinz National Wildlife Refuge, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/93qwzu">Ron Holmes/USFWS</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Hunting is a seasonal ritual for <a href="https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/new-5-year-report-shows-1016-million-americans-participated-hunting-fishing-wildlife">more than 11 million Americans</a> in fall and winter. For those whose quarry includes ducks, geese or other waterfowl, one essential item is a <a href="https://www.fws.gov/birds/get-involved/duck-stamp/history-of-the-federal-duck-stamp.php">Federal Duck Stamp</a> – one of the most innovative and influential conservation initiatives in U.S. history. </p>
<p>For more than 80 years, federal law has required all hunters age 16 and older to buy and carry the current season’s duck stamp in the field. The stamp costs US$25 and inspires an annual <a href="https://www.fws.gov/birds/get-involved/duck-stamp/duck-stamp-contest-and-event-information.php">art and design contest</a>. Ninety-eight cents of every dollar from stamp purchases goes into a fund to protect wetlands and wildlife habitat. Since the 1930s, duck stamps have raised <a href="https://www.fws.gov/birds/get-involved/duck-stamp/duck-stamp-dollars-at-work.php">over $1 billion</a> to support the <a href="https://www.fws.gov/refuges/">National Wildlife Refuge System</a>.</p>
<p>Duck stamps represent a “user pay, user benefit” approach to funding conservation that is unique to North America, with <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/00207233.2013.801178">hunters as the centerpiece</a>. But this model works only if people hunt, and the number of hunters in the United States has <a href="https://wsfrprograms.fws.gov/subpages/nationalsurvey/nat_survey2016.pdf">significantly declined</a> in recent decades. </p>
<p><a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=QdKvMEMAAAAJ&hl=en">My research</a> on connections between people and nature shows that demographic and cultural trends are <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/10871209.2014.850126">reshaping the modern landscape</a> for hunting and other outdoor recreation activities. For wildlife managers and outdoor advocates, these shifts are raising questions about <a href="https://www.npr.org/2018/03/20/593001800/decline-in-hunters-threatens-how-u-s-pays-for-conservation">who will pay for conservation in the future</a>.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250564/original/file-20181213-178570-8bgt1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250564/original/file-20181213-178570-8bgt1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250564/original/file-20181213-178570-8bgt1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250564/original/file-20181213-178570-8bgt1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250564/original/file-20181213-178570-8bgt1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=473&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250564/original/file-20181213-178570-8bgt1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250564/original/file-20181213-178570-8bgt1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250564/original/file-20181213-178570-8bgt1a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=594&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The 2017-2018 federal duck stamp, designed by James Hautman.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.fws.gov/birds/get-involved/duck-stamp/federal-duck-stamp-gallery-2017-2018.php">USFWS</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Taxes and license fees</h2>
<p>President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the <a href="https://www.fws.gov/birds/policies-and-regulations/laws-legislations/migratory-bird-hunting-and-conservation-stamp-act.php">Migratory Bird Hunting Stamp Act</a> in 1934. The program was proposed by <a href="https://www.fws.gov/duckstamp75/JayNorwood-DingDarling-FS.pdf">Jay N. “Ding” Darling</a>, a cartoonist, conservation pioneer and outdoorsman. Darling headed the agency that would become the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service from 1934 to 1936 and drew the first duck stamp.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250565/original/file-20181213-178579-12dy19y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250565/original/file-20181213-178579-12dy19y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250565/original/file-20181213-178579-12dy19y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=410&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250565/original/file-20181213-178579-12dy19y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=410&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250565/original/file-20181213-178579-12dy19y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=410&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250565/original/file-20181213-178579-12dy19y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=515&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250565/original/file-20181213-178579-12dy19y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=515&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250565/original/file-20181213-178579-12dy19y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=515&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The first federal duck stamp, designed by Jay N. ‘Ding’ Darling and issued in 1934.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.fws.gov/birds/get-involved/duck-stamp/federal-duck-stamp-gallery-1934-1935.php">USFWS</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Other user-pay measures followed. The 1937 <a href="https://wsfrprograms.fws.gov/subpages/grantprograms/wr/wr.htm">Pittman-Robertson Act</a> imposed an 11 percent federal excise tax on sales of hunting gear and ammunition to support state wildlife conservation efforts. In 1950 the <a href="https://wsfrprograms.fws.gov/subpages/grantprograms/sfr/sfr.htm">Dingell-Johnson Act</a> placed a similar tax on fishing equipment and motor boat fuel. Today these taxes, along with duck stamps and license fees, raise roughly 60 percent of all revenue to support fish and wildlife conservation efforts yearly. </p>
<h2>Broadening the conservation funding base</h2>
<p>License fees and gear taxes target specific groups (hunters and anglers), but duck stamps could also appeal to other potential buyers, such as birdwatchers, photographers and stamp collectors. They serve as an annual pass to U.S. National Wildlife Refuges that charge entrance fees, and organizations such as the American Birding Association encourage birders to “<a href="https://www.aba.org/stamp/">make their voices heard</a>” in wildlife conservation by purchasing duck stamps. However, there is very little information about whether and why birders actually buy the stamps. </p>
<p>To answer these questions, I worked with graduate student <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Nathan_Shipley">Nathan Shipley</a>, NCSU colleague <a href="https://faculty.cnr.ncsu.edu/carencooper/">Caren Cooper</a> and researchers from the <a href="https://www.audubon.org/">National Audubon Society</a> to survey thousands of birdwatchers participating in the society’s annual <a href="https://www.audubon.org/conservation/science/christmas-bird-count">Christmas Bird Count</a>. <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/10871209.2018.1517227">We found</a> that just 14 percent of nonhunting bird count participants had purchased duck stamps in the past two years. Even among specialized birdwatchers who invested substantial time and money in birding, only 36 percent had bought the stamps. </p>
<p>These low numbers may reflect a general lack of knowledge about duck stamps and their purpose. For example, studies have shown that even waterfowl hunters <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/10871209.2017.1310960">know very little</a> about the duck stamp’s role in wildlife conservation. Other research has found <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/10871200802562372">low awareness</a> among nonhunting outdoor advocates about hunting’s links to environmental stewardship and conservation. And birders may be reluctant to buy something historically linked to hunting. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/bFGMoFIjKRM?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Wetland conservation video produced by Ducks Unlimited, a nonprofit formed by sportsmen in 1937 that conserves, restores and manages wetlands and associated habitats for North America’s waterfowl.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Despite ideological differences, however, both birdwatchers and hunters <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/jwmg.855">are more likely than nonrecreationists</a> to engage in pro-environmental behaviors such as joining conservation organizations, volunteering to enhance wildlife habitat on public lands and donating money to support conservation. But while birdwatchers may be just as eager to contribute to conservation as hunters, our research indicates that duck stamps are not currently an effective way to financially engaging the birding community.</p>
<h2>Recruiting new hunters</h2>
<p>Since 2011, the number of big game hunters in the United States has decreased by 20 percent, and the total number of hunters has <a href="https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2018/demo/fhw-16-nat.html">declined by over 2 million</a>. This trend leaves wildlife managers two primary options for boosting conservation funding: Attract new hunters or find other revenue sources. </p>
<p>The first strategy, often referred to as <a href="http://www.cahss.org/what-is-r3/">R3</a> – recruitment, retention and reactivation – is rapidly gaining traction in the wildlife management world. My colleagues and I have spent much of the past five years studying <a href="https://doi.org/10.1080/10871209.2017.1334247">nontraditional pathways into hunting</a>, including growing interest in links between wild game meat and the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/wsb.802">local food movement</a>. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250677/original/file-20181214-185246-1d7kj8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250677/original/file-20181214-185246-1d7kj8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/250677/original/file-20181214-185246-1d7kj8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250677/original/file-20181214-185246-1d7kj8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250677/original/file-20181214-185246-1d7kj8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250677/original/file-20181214-185246-1d7kj8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250677/original/file-20181214-185246-1d7kj8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/250677/original/file-20181214-185246-1d7kj8z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Adam Ahlers of Kansas State University guides students on their first hunting experience.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Haley Ahlers</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/">CC BY-ND</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Our <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BHKu4R2h12P3oaIWJKSDOLiSae5vGP3r/view?usp=sharing">current project</a>, which spans 23 states, is exploring the potential impact of R3 efforts focused on college students. Preliminary results suggest that over 70 percent of college students support hunting. Roughly one in six plan to hunt in the future, and one in four would consider trying it. </p>
<h2>Finding new revenue streams</h2>
<p>However, other funding sources are also needed. As one example, in 2009 thousands of wildlife professionals, hunters, birdwatchers and other recreationists endorsed the <a href="https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/110/s2670">Teaming with Wildlife Act</a>, which would have introduced a new excise tax on nonconsumptive recreation gear such as binoculars, tents and kayaks. The bill failed to pass, largely due to limited support from retailers.</p>
<p>In 2016, the Blue Ribbon Panel on Sustaining America’s Fish & Wildlife Resources – a bipartisan group comprising leaders across government, industry and the nonprofit sector – released <a href="https://www.fishwildlife.org/application/files/8215/1382/2408/Blue_Ribbon_Panel_Report2.pdf">a report</a> urging Congress to dedicate up to $1.3 billion annually in revenues from energy production and mining on federal lands and waters to support wildlife conservation. This recommendation has been integrated into the <a href="http://wildlife.org/policy/recovering-americas-wildlife-act/">Recovering America’s Wildlife Act</a>, which was introduced in the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/house-bill/4647/cosponsors">House</a> in December 2017 and the <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/3223/cosponsors?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22s.+3223%22%5D%7D&r=1&s=1">Senate</a> in July 2018, and attracted bipartisan support in both chambers. </p>
<p>This approach also appears to be popular among future generations of voters. In our study of college students, we asked participants to evaluate nine potential options for funding wildlife conservation. The preferred strategy across all demographic subgroups, supported by over 80 percent of students, was requiring “companies that profit from natural resource extraction to contribute a portion of their annual revenue to conservation.”</p>
<p>Through duck stamps, excise taxes and license purchases, hunters (and anglers) will continue to play a critical role in the future of funding conservation. But other stakeholder groups, from birdwatchers to energy companies, can also contribute. If Congress passes the Recovering America’s Wildlife Act, it could open a new chapter in North America’s innovative history of funding wildlife conservation.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/105792/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Lincoln Larson receives funding from the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and the Association of Fish & Wildlife Agencies.</span></em></p>Much of the money for wildlife conservation in the United States comes from taxes and fees paid by sportsmen. But as fewer Americans take up hunting, wildlife managers need other funding sources.Lincoln Larson, Assistant Professor, North Carolina State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1057422018-10-31T03:21:12Z2018-10-31T03:21:12ZTrails on trial: which human uses are OK for protected areas?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242580/original/file-20181027-7062-x47aka.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=0%2C0%2C1498%2C674&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Mountain biking seems harmless but can damage soil and scare wildlife.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://pixabay.com/en/action-adventure-bicycle-bicyclist-1839225/">Pixabay</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>There’s no question about it: parks and protected areas are the absolute cornerstone of our efforts to protect nature. In the long term, we can’t save wildlife and ecosystems without them.</p>
<p>But <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25373676">people want to use parks too</a>, and in rapidly growing numbers. Around the world, parks are destinations for recreational activities like hiking, bird-watching and camping, as well as noisier affairs such as mountain-biking, snowmobiling and four-wheel-driving.</p>
<p>Where do we draw the line?</p>
<h2>Road risks</h2>
<p>Let’s start by looking at the roads that take us into and through parks. They can be a double-edged sword. </p>
<p>Roads are needed to allow tourists to access parks, but we have to be very careful where and how we build them. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242585/original/file-20181027-7053-17upxwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242585/original/file-20181027-7053-17upxwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242585/original/file-20181027-7053-17upxwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=369&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242585/original/file-20181027-7053-17upxwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=369&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242585/original/file-20181027-7053-17upxwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=369&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242585/original/file-20181027-7053-17upxwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242585/original/file-20181027-7053-17upxwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242585/original/file-20181027-7053-17upxwv.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=464&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Road for an industrial gold mine slicing through Panamanian rainforest.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Susan Laurance</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In regions where law enforcement is weak, roads can rip apart a forest — <a href="http://alert-conservation.org/issues-research-highlights/2017/5/25/road-rage-the-real-reason-roads-are-so-dangerous?rq=roads">sharply increasing illegal activities</a> such as poaching, deforestation and mining. </p>
<p>According to my (Bill’s) <a href="https://www.global-roadmap.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/Lauranceetal2017FEE5.pdf">research</a>, new roads – often driven by foreign mining or timber investors from nations such as China – could damage up to a third of all the protected areas in sub-Saharan Africa.</p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/the-global-road-building-explosion-is-shattering-nature-70489">The global road-building explosion is shattering nature</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>In <a href="https://congo.wcs.org/Wild-Places/Nouabale-Ndoki-National-Park.aspx">Nouabale Ndoke Park</a> in the Congo Basin, poaching wasn’t a big problem until a new road was built along the edge of the park. </p>
<p>Suddenly the fatal <em>rak-rak-rak</em> of AK-47 rifles – often aimed at elephants by ivory poachers – was being heard all too often.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242581/original/file-20181027-7044-t80cy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242581/original/file-20181027-7044-t80cy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242581/original/file-20181027-7044-t80cy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242581/original/file-20181027-7044-t80cy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242581/original/file-20181027-7044-t80cy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242581/original/file-20181027-7044-t80cy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242581/original/file-20181027-7044-t80cy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242581/original/file-20181027-7044-t80cy5.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Bill Laurance examines a forest elephant slaughtered by poachers in the Congo. The elephant’s face had been hacked off to extract its valuable ivory tusks.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Mahmoud Mahmoud</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Trails on trial</h2>
<p>Roads are one thing, but what about a simple bike trail or walking track? They let in people too. But they are harmless, right?</p>
<p>Not always. A <a href="https://www.lib.washington.edu/msd/norestriction/b67566091.pdf">2010 Canadian study</a> found that mountain biking causes a range of environmental impacts, including tyres chewing up the soil, causing compaction and erosion. This is a significant problem for fragile alpine vegetation in mountainous areas where many bikers like to explore. </p>
<p>Rapidly moving cyclists can also scare wildlife. In North America and Europe, many wild species, such as bears, wolves, caribou and bobcats, have been shown to <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/j.1755-263X.2008.00019.x">flee or avoid areas</a> frequented by hikers or bikers. </p>
<p>In Indonesia, even trails used by ecotourists and birdwatchers <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1046/j.1523-1739.1993.07030623.x">scared away some sensitive wildlife species</a> or caused them to shift to being active only at night.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242584/original/file-20181027-7041-1t2jpds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242584/original/file-20181027-7041-1t2jpds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242584/original/file-20181027-7041-1t2jpds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242584/original/file-20181027-7041-1t2jpds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242584/original/file-20181027-7041-1t2jpds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=398&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242584/original/file-20181027-7041-1t2jpds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242584/original/file-20181027-7041-1t2jpds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242584/original/file-20181027-7041-1t2jpds.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=500&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The red panda, an endangered species. Some wildlife avoid areas with even limited human use.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Pixabay</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Every type of human activity – be it hiking or biking or horse riding — has its own <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301479709003296?via%3Dihub">signature impact</a> on nature. We simply don’t know the overall effect of human recreation on parks and protected areas globally. </p>
<p>However, a <a href="https://theconversation.com/one-third-of-the-worlds-nature-reserves-are-under-threat-from-humans-96721">study</a> earlier this year found that roughly one-third of all terrestrial protected areas worldwide – a staggering 6 million square kilometres, an area bigger than Kenya – is already under “intense” human pressure. </p>
<hr>
<p>
<em>
<strong>
Read more:
<a href="https://theconversation.com/one-third-of-the-worlds-nature-reserves-are-under-threat-from-humans-96721">One-third of the world's nature reserves are under threat from humans</a>
</strong>
</em>
</p>
<hr>
<p>Roads, mines, industrial logging, farms, townships and cities all threaten these supposedly protected places. And on top of that are the impacts – probably lesser but still unquantified – of more benign human activities aimed at enjoying nature.</p>
<h2>Keep people out?</h2>
<p>Is the answer to stop people from visiting parks? </p>
<p>Not really. Visitors in many parts of the world help to <a href="https://www.cell.com/trends/ecology-evolution/fulltext/S0169-5347%2813%2900034-7?_returnURL=https%3A%2F%2Flinkinghub.elsevier.com%2Fretrieve%2Fpii%2FS0169534713000347%3Fshowall%3Dtrue">fund the operation</a> of national parks, and provide vital income for local people. </p>
<p>Exposure to nature is also one of the best ways to <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-a-walk-in-the-woods-really-does-help-your-body-and-your-soul-53227">enhance human health</a>, <a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0167691">build support for environmental protection</a>, and generate political momentum for the establishment of new protected areas. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242583/original/file-20181027-7068-18oedjk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242583/original/file-20181027-7068-18oedjk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242583/original/file-20181027-7068-18oedjk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242583/original/file-20181027-7068-18oedjk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242583/original/file-20181027-7068-18oedjk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242583/original/file-20181027-7068-18oedjk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242583/original/file-20181027-7068-18oedjk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242583/original/file-20181027-7068-18oedjk.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">A hiker in the Leuser Ecosystem, Indonesia.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">William Laurance</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>What’s more, locking people out of land is a very unpopular thing to do. Governments that block people from accessing nature reserves often face an electoral backlash.</p>
<h2>How to manage humanity</h2>
<p>If we accept that people must be able to use parks, what’s the best way to limit their impacts on ecosystems and wildlife? One way is to encourage them to stay on designated trails and tourist routes. </p>
<p>A <a href="https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1890/15-0113.1">recent study</a> (using geotagged data from photos) showed that half of all photos by park visitors were taken in less than 1% of each park. </p>
<p>In other words, most visitors use only a small, highly trafficked part of each park. That’s good news for nature. </p>
<p>If people tend to limit their activities to the vicinity of pretty waterfalls, spectacular vistas, and designated hiking areas, that leaves much of the park available for sensitive animals and ecosystems.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242577/original/file-20181027-7065-14pdin9.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242577/original/file-20181027-7065-14pdin9.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/242577/original/file-20181027-7065-14pdin9.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242577/original/file-20181027-7065-14pdin9.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242577/original/file-20181027-7065-14pdin9.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242577/original/file-20181027-7065-14pdin9.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242577/original/file-20181027-7065-14pdin9.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/242577/original/file-20181027-7065-14pdin9.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Forest elephants in Central Africa. In the past decade, two-thirds of all forest elephants have been wiped out by poachers and expanding roads.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Thomas Breuer/ Wikipedia</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>There are many opportunities for practical science and management. We want to help design protected areas in a way that lets people enjoy them – but which also focuses their activities in particular areas while retaining <a href="https://www.fs.usda.gov/treesearch/pubs/31042">large intact areas</a> where wildlife can roam free with little human disturbance. </p>
<p>And while we’re designing our parks, we want to use every opportunity, and every visit, to educate and empower tourists. We need people using parks to understand, appreciate, and stand up for nature, rather than thinking of parks as simply playgrounds.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/105742/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Bill Laurance receives funding from several philanthropic and scientific organisations. He is director of the Centre for Tropical Environmental and Sustainability Science at James Cook University, and founder and director of ALERT--the Alliance of Leading Environmental Researchers & Thinkers--a science-advocacy group that reaches up to 2 million readers weekly.
</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>David Salt does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>National parks and nature reserves are vital for conservation, but are also great places for recreation. Balancing the two is tricky, but it can be done if we realise parks are not just playgrounds.Bill Laurance, Distinguished Research Professor and Australian Laureate, James Cook UniversityDavid Salt, Science writer and editor, Australian National UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/948052018-07-24T10:28:05Z2018-07-24T10:28:05ZWhat’s the value of a clean beach? Here’s how economists do the numbers<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/228616/original/file-20180720-142438-1k3g67t.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">How much would you pay to make this disappear?</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/bwNakJ">Emilian Robert Vicol</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Millions of Americans head outdoors in the summer, whether for a day at a nearby lake or a monthlong road trip. For <a href="https://doi.org/10.1093/reep/rew019">environmental economists like me</a>, decisions by vacationers and outdoor recreators offer clues to a challenging puzzle: estimating what environmental resources are worth.</p>
<p>In 1981 President Ronald Reagan issued an <a href="https://www.archives.gov/federal-register/codification/executive-order/12291.html">executive order</a> that required federal agencies to weigh the costs and benefits of proposed major new regulations, and in most cases to adopt them only if the benefits to society outweighed the costs. Reagan’s order was intended to promote environmental improvements without overburdening economic growth.</p>
<p>Cost-benefit analysis has been so successful as a tool for policy analysis that <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-trump-misses-about-regulations-they-produce-benefits-as-well-as-costs-72470">every administration since Reagan has endorsed using it</a>. However, it requires measuring benefits that are not “priced” in typical markets. Fortunately, putting a price on non-market environmental outcomes, such as safer drinking water and fewer deaths from exposure to dirty air, has proved to be possible, and highly valuable. These estimates help to make the case for actions such as cleaning up beaches and protecting scenic areas.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/228618/original/file-20180720-142423-bcx24m.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/228618/original/file-20180720-142423-bcx24m.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/228618/original/file-20180720-142423-bcx24m.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=190&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228618/original/file-20180720-142423-bcx24m.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=190&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228618/original/file-20180720-142423-bcx24m.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=190&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228618/original/file-20180720-142423-bcx24m.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=239&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228618/original/file-20180720-142423-bcx24m.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=239&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228618/original/file-20180720-142423-bcx24m.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=239&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Studies by the EPA have calculated that the benefits of avoided deaths and illnesses resulting from the Clean Act far outweigh the costs to society of complying with the law.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.epa.gov/transportation-air-pollution-and-climate-change/accomplishments-and-success-air-pollution-transportation">EPA</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>What’s it worth to you?</h2>
<p>According to a preliminary estimate from the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, outdoor recreation <a href="https://www.bea.gov/outdoor-recreation/">adds US$373 billion to the U.S. economy yearly</a>. That’s 2% of our annual gross domestic product – more than agriculture, mining or utilities, and approaching the <a href="https://www.bea.gov/iTable/iTable.cfm?ReqID=51&step=1#reqid=51&step=51&isuri=1&5114=a&5102=1">economic contribution of national defense</a>.</p>
<p>Most policymakers and local communities measure the economic value of outdoor recreation through estimates like this, which calculate how much money it adds to local economies through direct expenditures. For example, vacationers rent hotel rooms, and their spending pays employee salaries and funds local investments through hotel taxes. Visitors to national parks pay entrance fees for park upkeep, and augment local economies through employee wages and other expenditures on food and services around the park. </p>
<p>But recreation decisions also reveal the value that people place on the environment itself. Outdoor destinations provide services, such as opportunities to swim or hike in unspoiled settings. If high levels of <a href="https://ohiowatersheds.osu.edu/node/1530">harmful bacteria</a> close a beach I was planning to visit, I may choose to drive a longer distance to a beach with clean water. By quantifying such increases in time and out-of-pocket expenditures, economists can measure people’s willingness to pay for changes in environmental quality.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/228649/original/file-20180720-142423-178939m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/228649/original/file-20180720-142423-178939m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/228649/original/file-20180720-142423-178939m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228649/original/file-20180720-142423-178939m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228649/original/file-20180720-142423-178939m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228649/original/file-20180720-142423-178939m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228649/original/file-20180720-142423-178939m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228649/original/file-20180720-142423-178939m.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Travelers’ willingness to spend time and money visiting remote attractions like Yellowstone National Park in Wyoming help economists estimate how the public values those places.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://flic.kr/p/Ye6Bi5">NPS/Jacob W. Frank</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Funding beach cleanups</h2>
<p>In one recent study, I worked with other researchers to estimate increased travel and time expenditures that people incurred to avoid <a href="https://doi.org/10.1086/697152">trash and debris on 31 Southern California beaches</a>. No one wants to go to a beach littered with hypodermic needles, plastic bottles and discarded fishing nets. But cleaning up marine debris is expensive, and it is hard for communities to recover the costs, particularly for public beaches with open access. Understanding the value of cleaner beaches can help build support for funding trash collection.</p>
<p>To measure the amount of debris, we hired workers to walk the beaches tallying quantities of trash. Then we surveyed Southern California residents about how often and where they went to the beach, which enabled us to correlate numbers of visitors at each beach with quantities of debris. Finally, using travel time and expenses for each visitor to visit each beach, we modeled the relationship between where they chose to go to the beach, how much they spent to get there, and the cleanliness of the beach.</p>
<p>Using this model, we found that visitors to these beaches would be willing to incur $12.91 in additional costs per trip if each of the beaches had 25 percent less debris. This translated into a total willingness to pay $29.5 million for action to reduce marine debris by 25 percent on these beaches.</p>
<h2>Reducing harmful algal blooms in Lake Erie</h2>
<p>Trash on beaches is mainly an aesthetic nuisance, but some resource problems are more severe. For example, warm weather often triggers <a href="https://theconversation.com/nutrient-pollution-voluntary-steps-are-failing-to-shrink-algae-blooms-and-dead-zones-81249">harmful algal blooms in Lake Erie’s western basin</a>. These outbreaks, which are caused by agricultural and urban phosphorous pollution, contain freshwater toxins that are dangerous to humans and animals. They can trigger beach closures, and sometimes even drinking water bans. </p>
<p>Using similar techniques to the California study, I worked with another group of economists to estimate the <a href="http://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/274026">economic value of reducing outbreaks of harmful algal blooms in Lake Erie</a>. To model the relationship between recreation and water quality, we combined satellite data on harmful algal outbreaks in the lake in the summer of 2016 with visit patterns from a survey of Lake Erie visitors. Once again, we used travel time to each visited site and out-of-pocket expenditures to get there to represent the price of a trip. Then we correlated the price of a trip with the location of the visit and the presence of harmful algal blooms. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/228648/original/file-20180720-142423-1gblq0a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/228648/original/file-20180720-142423-1gblq0a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/228648/original/file-20180720-142423-1gblq0a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228648/original/file-20180720-142423-1gblq0a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228648/original/file-20180720-142423-1gblq0a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228648/original/file-20180720-142423-1gblq0a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228648/original/file-20180720-142423-1gblq0a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/228648/original/file-20180720-142423-1gblq0a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Algal toxin warning sign on an empty Maumee Bay State Park public beach on Lake Erie in Oregon, Ohio, Sept. 15, 2017.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Awash-In-Algae/6c035746838c4d028d19c0bbf12e0915/9/0">AP Photo/Paul Sancya</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Our results showed that reducing these outbreaks through a 40 percent reduction in phosphorous runoff to the Lake Erie Basin would save swimmers, boaters and fishermen $800,000 to $970,000 per year by reducing the need for them to travel extra distance to avoid algal blooms. </p>
<p>In spring 2018, Ohio <a href="https://www.cbsnews.com/news/toxic-algae-leads-ohio-to-designate-western-lake-erie-as-impaired/">declared the western Lake Erie watershed to be “impaired”</a> by algal blooms, meaning it does not meet federal water quality standards. Our study provides one measurement of Ohio residents’ willingness to pay for a cleaner lake.</p>
<h2>Avoiding a major oil spill</h2>
<p>People can choose different destinations to avoid dirty beaches or algae outbreaks. But in the case of large-scale environmental disasters, such as the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010, vacationers are more likely to cancel their trips altogether. </p>
<p>In a study using survey data on canceled vacation trips to Northwest Florida in the year following the BP oil spill, I worked with other economists to estimate the <a href="https://doi.org/10.1086/697560">decrease in economic value to Northwest Florida coastal towns</a>. We found that the spill caused a 9 percent drop in trips to Northwest Florida beaches, causing total economic losses of $252 million to $332 million across the Florida panhandle. Those losses represent decisions to spend vacation time and money in places where there was less risk of encountering polluted beaches.</p>
<p>The Gulf coast stretches from western Florida to Texas and has numerous beaches and fishing towns, so this sum is probably just a small fraction of economic harm caused by the spill due to canceled travel. </p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/KywA97PeEWs?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Jacksonville, Florida, on the Atlantic coast benefited after the BP spill as travelers avoided the Gulf coast.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>The value of pricing nature</h2>
<p>Contrary to some environmentalists’ fears, putting a price on natural resources has encouraged decision-makers to recognize that natural capital is finite. Before, it was easy to assume that they were free to exploit. Now economic valuation research can help decision makers answer questions such as <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.aam8124">how much damage the BP spill did to natural resources</a>, and <a href="http://www.nber.org/papers/w21383">whether the benefits of the EPA’s Acid Rain Program exceeded the costs</a>. Assigning dollar values to natural resources makes it possible to use the power of markets to design policies and regulations that benefit all.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/94805/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Timothy Haab receives funding from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and the University of Florida. </span></em></p>What would you pay to keep trash off your favorite beach, or pollution away from a national park? Economists can tease these values out of our travel choices and use the numbers to help make policy.Timothy Haab, Professor of Environmental Economics, The Ohio State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/967612018-05-18T10:41:52Z2018-05-18T10:41:52ZWildfire risks are high again this year – here’s what travelers need to know<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219238/original/file-20180516-155579-19r0gde.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The Berry Fire burns in Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming, August 27, 2016.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="http://www.apimages.com/metadata/Index/Yellowstone-Wildfires/fe27225ebb9b4ab89cc4a0ee7cd0052d/63/0">AP Photo/Brennan Linsley, File</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Memorial Day marks the traditional opening of the summer travel season. This year the American Automobile Association <a href="https://newsroom.aaa.com/2018/05/nearly-42-million-americans-will-kick-off-summer-memorial-day-getaway/">projects</a> that more than 41.5 million Americans will hit the road over Memorial Day weekend, nearly 5 percent more than last year and the most in a dozen years.</p>
<p>For many years, AAA has urged drivers to prepare for trips through steps such as testing their car batteries, checking for engine coolant leaks, and making sure their tires are in good shape. The group also recommends packing a mobile phone and car charger, a flashlight with extra batteries, a first-aid kit, a basic toolkit, and drinking water and snacks for all passengers. </p>
<p>But travelers should also think about conditions beyond their cars. As coordinator of Colorado State University’s Veterinary Extension programs, I help people in rural and urban communities manage all kinds of threats that can affect them and their animals, from disease to disasters. When people travel in unfamiliar places, far from their social safety nets, they should know what challenging conditions exist and prepare appropriately. In particular, anyone visiting the western United States this summer should understand risks associated with wildfires, since once again the risk of fires is high in many areas.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/ixshLbXuUso?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Campfires can turn into wildfires if they aren’t extinguished properly.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Understanding fire conditions</h2>
<p>The 2017 wildfire season was one of the <a href="https://www.usda.gov/sites/default/files/documents/usda-doi-wildland-memorandum.pdf">most challenging years on record</a>. More than 71,000 wildfires burnt over 10 million acres. Federal agencies spent nearly US$3 billion on fire suppression, and 14 firefighters were killed in action.</p>
<p>This year the U.S. Forest Service expects <a href="https://www.predictiveservices.nifc.gov/outlooks/outlooks.htm">another above-average fire season</a>. Many parts of the Southwest that depend on winter precipitation for moisture are dry. Coupled with above-average growth of grasses last year, <a href="http://drought.unl.edu/monitoringtools/usdroughtmonitor.aspx">conditions are ripe</a> to turn a harmless spark into flames. Wildland fire potential is <a href="https://www.predictiveservices.nifc.gov/outlooks/outlooks.htm">forecast</a> to be above normal through August across portions of the Southwest, Great Basin, Southern California and the Pacific Northwest.</p>
<p>Wildland fires are fickle beasts that behave erratically, depending on wind speed and direction and the landscape over which they travel. If you are close to a fire, it can be difficult to tell which way the fire is moving. Firefighters, police and other first responders have access to information that defines the scope of a fire and the potential pattern of its movement. They use this information to define evacuation areas to keep people safe. It is essential to respect these boundaries. </p>
<p>Travelers in unfamiliar territory should research hazards they may face (including events such as blizzards, floods and tornadoes, as well as wildfires), and prepare accordingly. Here are some basic recommendations: </p>
<p>– Know where you are. GIS systems are convenient, but Siri may not always be available. Carry paper maps that you know how to read.</p>
<p>– Share your exact travel plans with friends or family. Inform them when you change course. Someone else should know where you think you are.</p>
<p>– Develop situational awareness. Pay attention to your environment: Seeing or smelling smoke is significant. Avoid rising rivers and flooded roads.</p>
<p>– Have a communication backup plan if cell service is not available. Sign up for <a href="http://safetyinformed.org/">reverse 911</a>, subscribe to an emergency communications service such as <a href="https://www.everbridge.com/">Everbridge</a>, or listen to AM channels advertised on road signs in rural communities. </p>
<p>– Check weather reports and respect red flag advisories.</p>
<p>– Respect warnings from local emergency managers and cooperate with first responders.</p>
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<h2>The human factor in wildfires</h2>
<p>People trigger most wildfires in the United States. According to a <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1617394114">2017 study</a>, 84 percent of wildfires federal and state agencies were called to fight between 1992 and 2012 were ignited by humans. Wildfires can also be ignited by lightning or sparks from railroads and power lines.</p>
<p>People start fires by discarding cigarettes carelessly, leaving campfires unattended or inadequately extinguished, and losing control of crop fires and prescribed burns. The 2017 study calculated that human actions have <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1617394114">tripled the length</a> of the national wildfire season, extending it into spring, fall and winter.</p>
<p>The U.S. Forest Service has been educating Americans about their role in preventing wildfires since 1942, when Disney lent it images of Bambi the fawn and his forest friends for an educational poster. The campaign was very popular and confirmed that an animal was an effective fire prevention symbol. Because Bambi was only on loan, the agency had to find a new animal symbol. A <a href="https://www.smokeybear.com/en">majestic, powerful and appealing bear</a> fit the bill.</p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219245/original/file-20180516-155569-zomp5z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219245/original/file-20180516-155569-zomp5z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/219245/original/file-20180516-155569-zomp5z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=845&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219245/original/file-20180516-155569-zomp5z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=845&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219245/original/file-20180516-155569-zomp5z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=845&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219245/original/file-20180516-155569-zomp5z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1062&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219245/original/file-20180516-155569-zomp5z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1062&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/219245/original/file-20180516-155569-zomp5z.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1062&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Smokey the Bear’s first appearance on a fire prevention poster, 1944.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.smokeybear.com/en/smokeys-history?decade=1940">USFS</a></span>
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<p>The <a href="https://www.smokeybear.com/en/smokeys-history/about-the-campaign">Smokey Bear Wildfire Prevention campaign</a>, the longest-running public service advertising campaign in U.S. history, started in August 1944. The initial poster depicted a bear pouring a bucket of water on a campfire. In 2001, Smokey’s catchphrase was updated to “Only You Can Prevent Wildfires.”</p>
<p>Smokey’s message to prevent unwanted and unplanned outdoor fires is as relevant and urgent today as it was in 1944. By learning about <a href="https://www.smokeybear.com/en/prevention-how-tos/campfire-safety">campfire safety</a>, safe management of <a href="https://www.smokeybear.com/en/prevention-how-tos/backyard-debris-burning">backyard debris burns</a>, and <a href="https://www.smokeybear.com/en/prevention-how-tos/equipment-use-and-maintenance/how-to-prepare-your-home-for-wildfire">protecting houses and property from wildfire</a>, Americans can make themselves safer, both on the road and at home.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/96761/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Ragan Adams has received funding from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture to support community animal disaster planning. She is a delegate to the Extension Disaster Educational Network.</span></em></p>With elevated wildfire risks forecast across much of the western US this summer, here’s how travelers can track local conditions, stay out of harm’s way and avoid accidentally starting fires.Ragan Adams, Coordinator, Veterinary Extension Specialist Group, Colorado State UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/922482018-05-15T10:27:37Z2018-05-15T10:27:37ZIs bigger really better?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218650/original/file-20180511-34006-p3bolc.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A luxury home near Philadelphia.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Alexandra Staub</span>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/">CC BY</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The United States is facing a housing crisis: Affordable housing <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/02/opinion/affordable-housing-crisis.html">is inadequate</a>, while luxury homes abound. Homelessness remains a <a href="https://www.hudexchange.info/resources/documents/2017-AHAR-Part-1.pdf">persistent problem</a> in many areas of the country. </p>
<p>Despite this, popular culture has often focused on housing as an opportunity for upward mobility: the <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/15295030903583549">American Dream wrapped within four walls and a roof</a>. The housing industry has contributed to this belief as it has promoted ideals of “living better.” Happiness is marketed as <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1527476408315115">living with both more space and more amenities</a>. </p>
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<p>As an <a href="https://stuckeman.psu.edu/faculty/alexandra-staub">architect and scholar</a> who examines how we shape buildings and how they shape us, <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Conflicted-Identities-Housing-and-the-Politics-of-Cultural-Representation/Staub/p/book/9781138297012">I’ve examined the trend</a> toward “more is better” in housing. Opulent housing is promoted as a reward for hard work and diligence, turning housing from a basic necessity into an aspirational product. </p>
<p>Yet what are the ethical consequences of such aspirational dreams? Is there a point where “more is better” creates an ethical dilemma?</p>
<h2>The better housing craze</h2>
<p>The average single-family home built in the United States in the 1960s or before was <a href="https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/programs-surveys/ahs/working-papers/Housing-by-Year-Built.pdf">less than 1,500 square feet</a> in size. By 2016, the median size of a new, single-family home sold in the <a href="https://www.census.gov/construction/chars/highlights.html">United States was 2,422 square feet</a>, almost twice as large.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218327/original/file-20180509-4803-2oyrdv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/218327/original/file-20180509-4803-2oyrdv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218327/original/file-20180509-4803-2oyrdv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218327/original/file-20180509-4803-2oyrdv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=340&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218327/original/file-20180509-4803-2oyrdv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218327/original/file-20180509-4803-2oyrdv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/218327/original/file-20180509-4803-2oyrdv.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=427&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">A new single-family home in 2016.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.census.gov/construction/chars/interactive/">www.census.gov</a></span>
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<p>Single-family homes built in the 1980s had a median of six rooms. By 2000, the <a href="https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/programs-surveys/ahs/working-papers/Housing-by-Year-Built.pdf">median number of rooms was seven</a>. What’s more, homes built in the 2000s were more likely than earlier models to have <a href="https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/programs-surveys/ahs/working-papers/Housing-by-Year-Built.pdf">more of all types of spaces</a>: bedrooms, bathrooms, living rooms, family rooms, dining rooms, dens, recreation rooms, utility rooms and, as the number of cars per family increased, garages. </p>
<p>Today, homebuilding companies <a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-Routledge-Companion-to-Modernity-Space-and-Gender/Staub/p/book/9781138746411">promote these expanding spaces</a> – large yards, spaces for entertainment, private swimming pools, or even home theaters – as needed for recreation and social events. </p>
<h2>Each home a castle?</h2>
<p>Living better is not only defined as having more space, but also as having more and newer products. Since at least the 1920s, when the “servant crisis” forced the mistress of the house to <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3103251?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">take on tasks</a> servants had once performed, marketing efforts have suggested that increasing the range of products and amenities in our home will make housework easier and family life more pleasant. The scale of such products has only increased over time.</p>
<p>In the 1920s, advertising suggested that middle-class women who had once had servants to do their more odious housework could now, with the right cleaners, be able to <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/3103251?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">easily do the job themselves</a>. </p>
<p>By the 1950s, advertisements touted coordinated kitchens as allowing women to save time on their housework, so they could <a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-Routledge-Companion-to-Modernity-Space-and-Gender/Staub/p/book/9781138746411">spend more time with their families</a>. More recently, advertisers have presented the house itself as a product that will improve the family’s social standing while providing ample space for family activities and togetherness for the parent couple, all the while <a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-Routledge-Companion-to-Modernity-Space-and-Gender/Staub/p/book/9781138746411">remaining easy to maintain</a>. The implication has been that even if our houses get larger, we won’t need to spend more effort running them.</p>
<p>In <a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-Routledge-Companion-to-Modernity-Space-and-Gender/Staub/p/book/9781138746411">my research</a>, I note that the housework shown – cooking, doing laundry, helping children with their homework – is presented as an opportunity for social engagement or family bonding. </p>
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<p>Advertisements never mentioned that more bathrooms also mean more toilets to scrub, or that having a large yard with a pool for the kids and their friends means hours of upkeep.</p>
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<h2>The consequences of living big</h2>
<p>As middle-class houses have grown ever larger, two things have happened.</p>
<p>First, large houses do take time to maintain. An army of cleaners and other service workers, many of them working for minimal wages, are required to keep the upscale houses in order. In some ways, we have returned to the era of even middle-class households employing low-wage servants, except that today’s servants no longer live with their employers, but are deployed by firms that <a href="http://books.wwnorton.com/books/978-0-393-73094-4/">provide little</a> in the way of wages or benefits.</p>
<p>Second, once-public spaces such as municipal pools or recreational centers, where people from diverse backgrounds used to randomly come together, have <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1068/b36057">increasingly</a> become privatized, allowing access only to <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Brave-New-Neighborhoods-The-Privatization-of-Public-Space/Kohn/p/book/9780415944632">carefully circumscribed groups.</a> Even spaces that seem public are often exclusively for the <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1068/b36057">use of limited populations</a>. For example, gated communities sometimes use taxpayer funds – money that by definition should fund projects open to the public – to build amenities such as roads, parks or playgrounds that may <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.2752/174063108X287364">only be used</a> by residents of the gated community or their guests. </p>
<p>Limiting access to amenities has had other consequences as well. An increase in private facilities for the well-off has gone hand in hand with a <a href="https://www.routledge.com/The-Politics-of-Public-Space/Low-Smith/p/book/9780415951395">reduction of public facilities</a> available to all, with a reduced quality of life for many.</p>
<p>Take swimming pools. Whereas in 1950, <a href="https://www.uncpress.org/book/9780807871270/contested-waters/">only 2,500 U.S. families owned in-ground pools</a>, by 1999 this number had risen to 4 million. At the same time, public municipal pools were often no longer maintained and many were shuttered, leaving low-income people nowhere to swim.</p>
<p>Mobility opportunities have been affected, too. For example, 65 percent of communities built in the 1960s or earlier had public transportation; by 2005, with an increase in multi-car families, <a href="https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/programs-surveys/ahs/working-papers/Housing-by-Year-Built.pdf">this was only 32.5 percent</a>. A reduction in public transit decreases opportunities for those who do not drive, such as youth, the elderly, or people who cannot afford a car.</p>
<h2>Redefining the paradigm</h2>
<p>“Living better” through purchasing bigger housing with more lavish amenities thus poses several ethical questions. </p>
<p>In living in the United States, how willing should we be to accept a system in which relatively opulent lifestyles are achievable to the middle class only through low-wage labor by others? And how willing should we be to accept a system in which an increase in amenities purchased by the affluent foreshadows a reduction in those amenities for the financially less endowed? </p>
<p>Ethically, I believe that the American Dream should not be allowed to devolve into a zero-sum game, in which one person’s gain comes at others’ loss. A solution could lie in redefining the ideal of “living better.” Instead of limiting access to space through its privatization, we could think of publicly accessible spaces and amenities as providing new freedoms though opportunities for engaging with people who are different from us and who might thus stretch our thinking about the world. </p>
<p>Redefining the American Dream in this way would open us to new and serendipitous experiences, as we break through the walls that surround us.</p>
<p><em>Editor’s note: This piece is part of our series on ethical questions arising from everyday life. We would welcome your suggestions. Please email us at <a href="mailto:ethical.questions@theconversation.com">ethical.questions@theconversation.com</a>.</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/92248/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alexandra Staub does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Middle-class houses in the US have grown ever larger. The average single-family home is almost twice the size of a home in the 1960s. It’s time to consider the downsides of sizing up.Alexandra Staub, Associate Professor of Architecture; Affiliate Faculty, Rock Ethics Institute, Penn StateLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/676262017-03-16T02:18:00Z2017-03-16T02:18:00ZWhy communities should be designing parks for older adults<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/156660/original/image-20170213-18095-gdaat4.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Older people in a park in Nanchang, China. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Author provided. </span>, <span class="license">Author provided</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>As America grays, healthy aging becomes essential. Physical activity or exercise is an important piece of this. Getting regular exercise of just 150 minutes of moderate physical activity per week has been linked to a reduction in heart disease, cancer, falls and cognitive impairment due to dementia, including <a href="https://books.google.com/books?id=7XbRBQAAQBAJ&lpg=PA151&dq=physical%20activity%20and%20healthy%20aging&lr&pg=PA151#v=onepage&q&f=false">Alzheimer-type dementia</a>. </p>
<p>The physical environment of where a person lives has been shown to <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK154491/">influence how much physical activity</a> they get. This is especially important for the rising number of older people in the U.S. </p>
<p>Parks are an important public health resource in our country, connecting Americans to nature, providing access to physical activity opportunities, and serving as a safe space for making social connections. With the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service in 2016, national parks received a great deal of attention. </p>
<p>While national parks are great assets to our nation, they tend to be located far from most Americans, limiting their day-to-day use. The same is true of state parks. Even though they are more abundant, state parks often require a longer drive than most people can make on a daily basis. </p>
<p>Community parks offer most Americans the opportunity to be active daily, but a study of 75 American cities found that just under 10 percent of total landmass was devoted to <a href="http://www.rff.org/files/sharepoint/WorkImages/Download/RFF-BCK-ORRG_Local%20Parks.pdf">city parks</a>. </p>
<p>Despite the many benefits of public parks, few American older adults take advantage of them. In a <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27311337">2016 review</a> we conducted of observational studies in parks, the median percentage of older adults in parks was only 5 percent. Our studies in <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18374243">Chicago, Tampa</a> and <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3181180/">Honolulu</a> showed that almost all neighborhood parks in these cities had basketball courts, playgrounds, baseball diamonds and other open fields for soccer and other team sports. </p>
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<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/156658/original/image-20170213-18104-x7k8nz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/156658/original/image-20170213-18104-x7k8nz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=322&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/156658/original/image-20170213-18104-x7k8nz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=322&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/156658/original/image-20170213-18104-x7k8nz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=322&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/156658/original/image-20170213-18104-x7k8nz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/156658/original/image-20170213-18104-x7k8nz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/156658/original/image-20170213-18104-x7k8nz.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=405&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
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<span class="caption">Basketball player in a park.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">www.shutterstock.com</span></span>
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<p>An assessment from the <a href="http://www.tpl.org/sites/default/files/2016%20City%20Park%20Facts_0.pdf">Trust for Public Lands</a> found that playgrounds, tennis court and ball grounds accounted for over 60 percent of city park facilities in the U.S., which reflects a bias toward the young. </p>
<p>But with about 15 percent of the population currently being over age 65, we need to rethink how we design parks so that they offer place for older people, too. As the number of seniors is expected to increase to <a href="https://www.census.gov/content/dam/Census/library/publications/2015/demo/p25-1143.pdf">one in four by 2060</a>, I’ll explain why it’s important to keep them in mind.</p>
<h2>Parks in China</h2>
<p>The lack of older adults in U.S. parks didn’t really strike me until we decided to conduct a <a href="https://www.ncbi.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4721293/">similar study</a> in China. </p>
<p>As I walked through the park in an old industrial city called Nanchang, it looked totally different from our American parks. There was a large lake with a stream flowing through the park, numerous bridges, exercise stations and small grottoes where impromptu exercise classes were being held. </p>
<p>The users were different, too. The park was teeming with older adults, with almost no teenagers in sight. As I visited three other parks on that trip, I knew we were about to discover some major differences. </p>
<p>When we <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4721293/">analyzed the data</a> from eight city parks and over 70,000 people in Chinese parks, we found over 50 percent of park users were older adults. We also found <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3945547/">a study from Taiwan</a> using the same methods that found a similar number of older adults.</p>
<p>In Nanchang, China, parks had walking trials, adult-oriented fitness machines, exercise pavilions and water features. Surprisingly, these parks did not have basketball courts, ball fields, and other teen-centric amenities. </p>
<p>We found that the amenities affect the users. Only 3 percent of the people found in the Chinese parks were teenagers. A recent study conducted in parks in Hong Kong, a city with strong Eastern and Western influences, found exercise equipment along with playgrounds and ball fields. In <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4962180/">Hong Kong</a>, about a quarter of the users were older adults.</p>
<h2>Parks for everybody</h2>
<p>It is still not clear why older adults seldom use public parks in the U.S. It might be a lack of features that interest them. It might be safety, with numerous teenagers using the park, or it might be transportation, or another issue altogether. This is an important issue for researchers to assess to help more adults be physically active. </p>
<p>So how did parks in the U.S. come to be built this way? </p>
<p>Surprisingly, early parks in the U.S. were built more like Chinese parks. <a href="http://friendsofthepublicgarden.org/our-parks/boston-common/history/">Boston Common</a>, the first city park in America, was opened in 1634 and features water features, walking paths and landscaping. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/156659/original/image-20170213-18123-o4jdx0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/156659/original/image-20170213-18123-o4jdx0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=321&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/156659/original/image-20170213-18123-o4jdx0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=321&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/156659/original/image-20170213-18123-o4jdx0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=321&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/156659/original/image-20170213-18123-o4jdx0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/156659/original/image-20170213-18123-o4jdx0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/156659/original/image-20170213-18123-o4jdx0.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=403&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">People walking in Boston Common in January 2015.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Charles Krupa/AP.</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>In the 1700s and 1800s, dozens of parks were created in major cities across the U.S., including the National Mall in Washington, D.C. and Central Park in New York City. These parks were designed to be pastoral, where nature was present but in a <a href="https://www.pps.org/reference/futureparks">tamed environment</a>.</p>
<p>In the early 1900s, the Progressive movement <a href="http://www.rff.org/files/sharepoint/WorkImages/Download/RFF-BCK-ORRG_Local%20Parks.pdf">changed parks</a> to focus more on children’s activities, including playgrounds. We are still feeling these effects today.</p>
<p>As we build our parks of tomorrow, we need to consider all users and construct parks that encourage activity throughout the lifespan. Hopefully, we can design parks with the best of American and Asian influences to create a more active and healthier America.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/67626/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jay Maddock does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>You don’t often see many of the nation’s 75 million seniors hanging out in parks. There may be a reason. Most parks are not designed with seniors in mind. Here are some ways to change that.Jay Maddock, Dean and Professor of Public Health, Texas A&M UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.