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Geospatial Analytics for Park & Protected Land Visitor Reservation Data

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Analytics in Smart Tourism Design

Part of the book series: Tourism on the Verge ((TV))

Abstract

Reservation databases utilized by parks and protected lands (PPLs) are a source of empirical data that holds a wealth of spatiotemporal information about both destination usage (from the supply side) and visitor characteristics (the demand population). Unfortunately, PPL reservation databases are rarely explored with these goals in mind. Geovisualizations of reservation data can be used to identify longitudinal patterns, trends and relationships that can help PPL managers generate knowledge useful in decision support. To demonstrate the knowledge that can be gained through geospatial analytics of PPL reservation data, 12.5 million reservation records from the recreation.gov database between January 1, 2007 and December 30, 2015 are examined. The database includes 3272 distinct destinations that provided camping, permitting or ticketing on U.S. Federal PPLs. This chapter discusses both the value of, and the methodology for, inductively exploring spatiotemporal PPL reservation data through geovisualization. Efforts such as those described in this chapter can provide decision support to managers of Federal, State and County agencies tasked with tourism and resource management.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, USA

    Stacy Supak, Gene Brothers, Ladan Ghahramani & Derek Van Berkel

Authors
  1. Stacy Supak
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  2. Gene Brothers
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  3. Ladan Ghahramani
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  4. Derek Van Berkel
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Stacy Supak .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Hospitality and Tourism Management, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg, Virginia, USA

    Zheng Xiang

  2. National Laboratory for Tourism & eCommerce Department of Tourism, Recreation and Sport Management, University of Florida, Gainesville, Florida, USA

    Daniel R. Fesenmaier

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Supak, S., Brothers, G., Ghahramani, L., Van Berkel, D. (2017). Geospatial Analytics for Park & Protected Land Visitor Reservation Data. In: Xiang, Z., Fesenmaier, D. (eds) Analytics in Smart Tourism Design. Tourism on the Verge. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-44263-1_6

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