Resource Brief

National Park Service U.S. Department of the Interior Acadia National Park

Visitor Impacts
Status and Trends
Acadia National Park has experienced increases in visitation over the past decade, accommodating more than two million visitors annually. Increasing use of the park can result in significant social and resource impacts. Too many visitors can degrade fragile natural and cultural resources, and crowding can lessen the quality of visitor experiences; however, little is known about the degree to which visitors are sensitive to the ecological and social impacts of park use or how important these impacts are in defining the quality of the visitor experience. In 2004, Acadia NP teamed up with researchers from the University of Vermont to conduct social science research in the most heavily visited and most impacted areas of the park, including Cadillac Mountain. With 500,000 people driving, hiking, and biking up to the summit each year, Cadillac Mountain is particularly susceptible to resource degradation. Extreme growing conditions (wind, cold, ice) and thin soils have resulted in a rare and fragile sub-alpine environment on the Cadillac Mountain summit. With few natural barriers, such as dense vegetation, cliffs, or larger rocks, the summit is vulnerable to damage from off-trail wandering and exploration. Many areas near designated trails on the summit have lost one to four inches of soil and most of their vegetative cover due to increased visitor use. In July 2009, researchers began administering the Acadia National Park Cadillac Mountain Visitor Survey to park visitors at the summit. Results from this survey will provide park managers with information about visitor perceptions and attitudes toward resource damage, crowding, and management on Cadillac Mountain, information needed to develop effective and acceptable management strategies. Survey results will be integrated into Acadia National Parks General Management Plan, which will guide park resource and visitor use management for years to come.

Importance
At 1,530 feet, Cadillac Mountain is the highest point along the North Atlantic coast. The impressive granite summit, rounded by glacial movements during the last ice age, is easily accessed by a winding, scenic road or hiking trails. Visitors flock to Cadillac Mountain for its stunning views, challenging hikes, and subalpine scenery; however, increasing visitor impacts threaten natural resources, visitor safety, and the quality of recreational experiences. Understanding visitor perceptions of the social and environmental impacts of increasing visitor use will help Acadia NP manage, protect, and preserve the important cultural, recreational, and ecological attributes of Cadillac Mountain. Visitor use can compact and erode soils, trample delicate vegetation (including several rare plant species), pollute surface water, and disturb sensitive wildlife. Trampling may reduce vegetation height and biomass, and could destroy fragile species. Disturbing the plant community also affects the species that depend on them for food, habitat, and cover. Concentrated visitor traffic can compact leaf litter and harden soils. Exposed soil is more vulnerable to wind and water erosion. Soil compaction decreases the size of pores in the soil and limits how much water can infiltrate the soil. This, in turn, increases water runoff. On trails, the impacts of increasing visitor use can include trail widening, muddiness, and the spread of visitor-created paths. Such impacts may ultimately threaten the ecological integrity of the unique cultural and natural resources on Cadillac Mountain.

Along the Cadillac Mountain summit loop path, visitors enjoy panoramic views of the Acadia NP, as well as the many islands in Frenchmans Bay and the Schoodic Peninsula across the water. On clear days, Nova Scotia and Mount Katahdin (both over 100 miles away) can be seen (Acadia Partners/S. Delheimer). Continued

EXPERIENCE YOUR AMERICA

August 2009

What do we want to understand?

1. How much and what types of visitor use are acceptable? 2. How much resource degradation is acceptable? 3. To what extent do visitors perceive environmental and social impacts of park use? 4. What types of visitor use and resource management are most acceptable?

Management Program
The Acadia National Park Cadillac Mountain Visitor Survey is part of a larger Visitor Experience and Resource Protection (VERP) program aimed at maintaining the quality of the visitor experience and protecting natural and cultural resources in the face of increasing visitor use. The program is designed to help parks collect baseline data on visitor use and associated resource and social impacts, identify indicators and standards of quality for resource conditions and visitor experience, and select and implement management actions. Specifically, the recently conducted survey assesses visitors perceptions of resource damage, standards of quality for resource conditions and crowding, and preferences for management actions on Cadillac Mountain. In July 2009, researchers surveyed 250 visitors coming off the Summit Loop Path on Cadillac Mountain. Visitors who agreed to participate spent five to ten minutes filling out an on-site questionnaire about the quality of their visit to Cadillac Mountain, and their perceptions of resource degradation, crowding, and management techniques.

Survey participants refer to four panels of photographs to answer questions about resource damage, crowding, and management on the Cadillac summit (Acadia Partners/S. Delheimer).

The questionnaire referred visitors to four panels of photographs. Each panel consisted of array of four to six photographs illustrating varying degrees of resource damage, increasing amounts of crowding on the Cadillac Mountain summit and trails, and different management strategies. Participants were asked to rate the acceptability of the resource damage or crowding that each photo depicted. Participants were also asked to indicate which photo best represented the conditions they encountered during their visit, the conditions they would prefer to encounter, the conditions that would detract from the visitor experience, and the conditions at which resource management or visitor use restrictions would be necessary. Survey respondents rated photographs depicting various management strategies, such as signs, ropes, low fences, log barriers, and path markers, based on how acceptable it would be to use each practice on Cadillac Mountain. By examining visitor perceptions and preferences, this study will help park managers develop resource and visitor use management practices that are effective in guiding visitor behavior in ways that reduce the harmful impacts on natural resources and improve the visitor experience at Acadia National Park.

Each panel includes a series of photos edited to illustrate different levels of visitor impacts, such as crowding on trails (Acadia Partners/S. Delheimer).

More Information
Charlie Jacobi Natural Resource Specialist Links & Resources Signs, low rope fences, and log barricades are used to keep visitor traffic on designated paths and off fragile plant communities on the summit (Acadia Partners/S. Delheimer). Phone/Email 207-288-8727 charlie_jacobi@nps.gov

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