Use of Recreation Opportunity Planning to Inventory Arid Lands in Eastern Oregon - A Demonstration

— This paper reports on the use of computer and hand dravm techniques for Implementing the Recreation Oppor­ tunity Planning inventory and analysis phases for the Steens Mountain Recreation Lands. Techniques were compared for land classifications and time and monetary costs. Results show computer mapping less likely to result in classification er­ rors, but more costly to conduct. The USDI Bureau of Land Management and USDA Forest Service have recently adopted Recreation Opportunity Planning as their primary recreation inventory and evaluation methodology* 3 During its development, Recreation Opportunity Planning has undergone considerable refinement as it has been tried in new situations. One recent refinement of the inventory and analysis phases of Recreation Opportunity Planning has been the development of computer software for storage, retrieval, mapping, and tabulation of recreation resource data (Berry and Brown 1980). This computer program uses the Map Analysis Package (MAP, Tomlin and Berry 1979) and was developed to provide a cost and space effi­ cient alternative to manual production of recrea­ tion opportunity maps, to manual preparation of tabular information, and to map overlay data stor­ age. The purpose of this paper is to report findings from a study designed to compare manual 1Paper presented at the workshop on Arid land resource inventories: Developing cost-efficient methods. LaPaz, Mexico. November 30-December 6, 1980. The authors wish to thank Dr. J. K. Berry of the School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, Yale University, for his help in making the MAP computer program operational at Oregon State Univer­ sity and Stephen Nofield and Marty Lee for conduct­ ing the hand drawn ROP inventory and analysis of Steens Mountain. 2Michael J. Manfredo is Assistant Professor and Perry J. Brown is Professor and Head of Re­ source Recreation Management, Oregon State Uni­ versity, Corvallis, Oregon. 3Recreation Opportunity Planning is described in these proceedings in the paper by Brown, P. J., B. L. Driver, and J. K. Berry, "Use of the recrea­ tion opportunity planning system to inventory rec­ reation opportunities of arid lands." and computer technologies in performing the Recre­ ation Opportunity Planning inventory and analysis. In the process of generating data to compare these two technologies, the feasibility of using Recrea­ tion Opportunity Planning inventory and analysis on arid lands was demonstrated by applying it to the Steens Mountain Recreation Area in Southeast­ ern Oregon. The objective of this study was *to produce recreation opportunity maps by both hand drawn and computer mapping techniques under Various information requirements and then compare the time and monetary costs associated with the two tech­ niques. The Steens Mountain Recreation Area, managed by the Burns District of the USDI Bureau of Land Management, covers approximately 960 square kilo­ meters of a very sparsely populated landscape. The nearest community is about 95 kilometers away. Steens Mountain is a fault block characterized by steadily rising terrain on its western slope and an abrupt escarpment on its eastern slope. The more accessible western slope offers a variety of recreation opportunities. Prime recreational at­ tractions are several scenic vistas, rugged canyons, good fishing in the major streams and high mountain lakes, developed campgrounds, and many species of game and non-game wildlife. In 1979 the area re­ ceived 25,535 visitor days1* of use with fishing, hiking, camping, off-road vehicle use, and hunting as the most popular activities. RECREATION OPPORTUNITY PLANNING INVENTORY AND ANALYSIS The inventory and analysis phases of Recrea­ tion Opportunity Planning allow the planner to assess an area for its ability to provide recrea**A visitor day represents 12 hours of recrea­ tion use by one person.