Defining Wilderness Quality: the Role of Standards in Wilderness Management—A Workshop Proceedings
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This file was created by scanning the printed publication. Text errors identified by the software have been corrected; however, some errors may remain. Defining Wilderness Quality: The Role of Standards in Wilderness Management—a Workshop Proceedings Fort Collins, Colorado April 10-11,1990 Bo Shelby, George Stankey, and Bruce Shindler, Technical Editors Department of Forest Resources Oregon State University Sponsored by: Department of Forest Resources, Oregon State University Department of Recreation Resources and Landscape Architecture, Colorado State University Wilderness Management Program, Pacific Northwest Region, USDA Forest Service Published by: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service Pacific Northwest Research Station Portland, Oregon General Technical Report PNW-GTR-305 November 1992 Abstract Shelby, Bo; Stankey, George; Shindler, Bruce. 1992. Defining wilderness quality: the role of standards in wilderness management—a workshop proceedings; 1990 April 10-11; Fort Collins, CO. PNW-GTR-305. Portland, OR: U.S. Department of Agri- culture, Forest Service, Pacific Northwest Research Station. 114 p. Integral to maintaining wilderness quality is the implementation of ecological, social, and management standards. A substantial body of wilderness research and management experience exists nationwide as a common-pool resource for professionals with a spe- cialized interest in incorporating standards into planning processes. In a 2-day interactive workshop, wilderness managers and researchers joined together to assess the current use of standards, summarize and integrate what has been learned, capitalize on the diversity of this work, and develop ideas about directions for the future. The 14 papers in this proceedings represent their collaborative efforts. Keywords: Wilderness management, wilderness standards, management objectives, environmental impacts, environmental indicators, monitoring. CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 1 Defining Wilderness Quality: The Role of Standards in Wilderness Management Bo Shelby, George Stankey, Bruce Shindler RESEARCH 6 Developing Good Standards: Criteria, Characteristics, and Sources Doug Whittaker, Bo Shelby 13 Selecting Indicators: Which Impacts Matter More? Doug Whittaker 23 Establishing Management Standards: Selected Examples of the Normative Approach Jerry Vaske, Maureen P. Donnelly, Bo Shelby 38 Measuring Backcountry Standards in Visitor Surveys Maureen P. Donnelly, Jerry Vaske, Bo Shelby 53 Countering the Law of Diminishing Standards Bruce Shindler 61 Standards for Managing Non-Wilderness Recreation Areas Mark Brunson, Don Rodriguez 67 Beyond Standard Standards: Incorporating Nonrecreational Values into Wilderness Management Robert E. Manning DEBATE 76 A Case for National Standards for Wilderness Management Joseph F. Higgins 79 Do We Really Want Wilderness Standards to be Uniform? Jerry M. Mitchell EXAMPLES AND CASE STUDIES 85 The Genesis of Wilderness Standards for the Pacific Northwest Region Bernard A. Smith, Joseph F. Higgins 88 Wilderness Monitoring Research in the Bureau of Land Management Michael Sestak, Alien Riebau 94 Management Standards for the Colorado River Within Grand Canyon National Park Jerry M. Mitchell 101 Matching Impacts with Standards in the Design of Wilderness Permit Systems Mark Brunson, Bo Shelby, Jay Goodwin 107 User Assessment of Ecological and Social Campsite Attributes Bruce Shindler, Bo Shelby ACKNOWLEDGMENT individual reviews were done anonymously, we can now publicly acknowledge the efforts of Brian This publication is the result of a collective effort Cunninghame, Maureen Donnelly, Glenn Haas, supported by a number of organizations and William Hammitt, David Lime, Robert Manning, individuals. The initial workshop was supported by a Margaret Petersen, David Porter, Joseph Roggenbuck, sabbatical leave from the College of Forestry at John Schomaker, Bo Shelby, George Stankey, Lance Oregon State University. Financial support was Tyler, and Daniel Williams. The authors of the provided by the Wilderness Management Program, manuscripts accept responsibility for any shortcomings. Region 6, United States Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. Administrative and staff support was Publication of this document was done under the provided by the Department of Recreation Resources auspices of the Consortium for Social Values of and Landscape Architecture, Colorado State Natural Resources, with cooperation from People and University. We are particularly thankful to Joe Natural Resources RD & A; Pacific Northwest Higgins and Margaret Petersen, whose interest in this Research Station, U.S. Department of Agriculture, project is just one example of a commitment to Forest Service; and the Department of Forest wilderness management that has made the Forest Resources, Oregon State University. We particularly Service program in Region 6 an outstanding example appreciate the efforts of Rebecca Nightingale at for others to follow. Oregon State University and Karen Esterholdt of the Pacific Northwest Research Station to turn disparate A number of reviewers helped improve the quality of manuscripts into a single finished product. the manuscripts presented here. Although the INTRODUCTION WORKSHOP ON DEFINING WILDERNESS QUALITY: THE ROLE OF STANDARDS IN WILDERNESS MANAGEMENT Bo Shelby, George Stankey, and Bruce Shindler This publication represents the collective efforts of an attempting to achieve and the actions necessary to interdisciplinary group of wilderness researchers and reach those ends. Current planning strategies rely managers from around the country. It is the result of upon standards as a crucial component of good a workshop on 'Defining Wilderness Quality: The professional management. These include the Limits Role of Standards in Wilderness Management," held of Acceptable Change (LAC) planning system on April 10-11, 1990 in Fort Collins, Colorado. The (Stankey et al., 1985), the Carrying Capacity workshop was sponsored jointly by the Wilderness Assessment Process (C-CAP; Shelby and Heberlein Program at the Pacific Northwest Regional Office of 1986), and the Visitor Impact Management (VIM) the USDA Forest Service, the Department of Forest framework (Graefe et al., 1990). Although these three Resources at Oregon State University, and the systems differ in some respects, all rely heavily upon Department of Recreation Resources and Landscape measurable standards as a means of defining Architecture at Colorado State University. unambiguous conditions regarding management objectives, outputs, or performance. Standards in wilderness management have become increasingly important. Attention has increasingly The purpose of this workshop was to review the body turned to defining desired conditions and developing of management and research experience with regard specific measures of those conditions in order that to standards. It also provided a forum to explore how managers have a better idea of what they are different approaches to standard formulation could occur, address concerns about their mis-use, and discuss the experience gained in applying standards across a wide range of settings and conditions. By Bo Shelby, Professor; George Stankey, Professor; and Bruce capitalizing on the collective wisdom of the group and Shindler, Doctoral Candidate and Faculty Research Assistant; Dept. of Forest Resources, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR. the individual and collaborative efforts of the 1 participants, it was possible to develop a Standards focus attention on future conditions, and comprehensive state-of-the-art synthesis of the role of they are output oriented. By highlighting future standards in wilderness management. conditions, standards encourage managers to be proactive and to focus on what it will take to achieve The papers in this volume are organized around three or maintain desired conditions, rather than waiting for themes. Papers in the first group examine the problems to occur and then reacting to them. A characteristics of good standards, describe the process major feature of standards is that they direct attention for selecting indicators, describe and give examples of to the outputs of management (i.e., the social and the normative approach to developing standards, resource conditions) as opposed to inputs, such as the describe examples of ways that standards have been number of visitors or number of work days spent measured, and discuss the usefulness of standards for rehabilitating sites. Such a perspective helps define management of non-wilderness areas. The second specific and measurable attributes to which group provides contrasting views about the desirability management can aspire in their efforts to define and of developing uniform or national versus area-specific improve "wilderness quality." standards. Finally, the last group of papers provides examples of standards from around the country, Standards are not only of value to managers and including the genesis of standards in the Pacific researchers, but to visitors as well. Most importantly, Northwest region of the Forest Service, the use of they constitute a means by which informed and standards in the BLM wilderness program, and realistic expectations can be developed. Standards specific examples from Grand Canyon National Park, may also represent an educational tool to help visitors the Enchantment Peaks area of the Alpine Lakes select areas whose conditions most nearly coincide Wilderness, and interest group standards for campsite with their desired experience. This also provides a impacts