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Comparative efficacy of multimodal digital methods in assessing trail/resource degradation

Informally Refereed

Abstract

Outdoor recreation can cause both positive and negative impacts on associated forest ecosystems. Forest recreation trails localize negative impacts to a controlled spatial extent while providing recreation access beyond developed areas and transportation networks. Current methods for assessing extent and severity of trail and proximal resource degradation require onsite expert assessment. The methods are analog—e.g., tape measure—although data may be recorded digitally by handheld global positioning system (GPS) using: (1) spatially sparse discontinuous point sampling, or (2) continuous problem assessment that relies on site-dependent (i.e., not generalizable) condition classing sometimes built upon classes that are not mutually exclusive.

Parent Publication

Citation

Park, Logan O. 2014. Comparative efficacy of multimodal digital methods in assessing trail/resource degradation. In: Groninger, John W.; Holzmueller, Eric J.; Nielsen, Clayton K.; Dey, Daniel C., eds. Proceedings, 19th Central Hardwood Forest Conference; 2014 March 10-12; Carbondale, IL. General Technical Report NRS-P-142. Newtown Square, PA: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Northern Research Station: 266.
https://www.fs.usda.gov/research/treesearch/47423