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Natural amenities like green open space are a valuable resource to support quality of life and public health. However, limited studies have analyzed the relationship between such resources and specific indicators of public health. We investigate the relationship between natural green space and publicly managed recreation lands and adult obesity prevalence in United States counties. We find that counties with larger percentage of green spaces and those with access to public open space, such as state and national parks do have significantly fewer numbers of obese people.

Amenities at recreation sites are important not only to maintain healthy life of recreation sites, but also to provide visitors greater inspiration to visit these sites. Hence, people place importance on site amenities, based on the activities they participated in. Using freshwater-based recreation data from a national survey and employing spectral analysis and rank ordered logit model, we found that closeness and size were the two most important qualities. Further, we found that recreationalist boaters were more likely to place importance on closeness; swimmers, recreationalist boaters, and picnickers were more likely to place importance on water-quality; and recreationalist fishermen and bird/nature viewers were more likely to place importance on wildlife, while participating in freshwater-based recreations. Freshwater recreation managers may benefit from the findings as our results offer guidance in understanding what kind of attributes to manage as well as improve to meet the needs of various types of user groups.

In addition to encouraging people to become more physically active and healthy, participation in outdoor recreation helps to expose people to different instances of environmental degradation in places where they recreate. This exposure may also help people to become more environmentally aware and subsequently informed about environmental conservation programs such as conservation easements. Hence, this paper examined whether people participating in outdoor recreation activities have also placed their lands in conservation easements. Using national level data from the National Survey on Recreation and the Environment (NSRE) people who participated in land-based and water-based recreation activities were examined and grouped into consumptive and non-consumptive activities. Results indicated people who participated in land-based non-consumptive recreations have greater odds of placing their lands in conservation easements than people who participated in consumptive recreation activities.

This paper explores the influence of demographic and spatial variables on individual participation and consumption of wildland area recreation. Data from the National Survey on Recreation and the Environment are combined with geographical information system-based distance measures to develop nonlinear regression models used to predict both participation and the number of days of participation in wilderness and primitive area recreation. The estimated models corroborate previous findings indicating that race (black), ethnicity (Hispanic), immigrant status, age, and urban dwelling are negatively correlated with wildland visitation, while income, gender (male), and education positively affect wildland recreation participation and use. The presence of a distance or proximity factor mitigates some of the influence of race and ethnicity. The results of the cross-sectional models are combined with U.S. Census projections of total population, changes in population characteristics, and estimates of current National Forest Wilderness visitation estimates to give some insight into pressure that might be expected on the nation’s designated wilderness during the next half century. Results generally indicate that per-capita participation and visitation rates will decline over time as society changes. Total wilderness participation and visitation will, however, increase, but at a rate less than population growth.

A logit model was used to determine the major factors explaining willingness to participate of an individual in the wilderness or other primitive area visits. The results of the study showed that education and environmental awareness were in wilderness participation decision. Demographic variables like age, race, and sex also were statistically significant and emerged as important policy variables in defining wilderness participation behavior. Characteristics of wilderness areas like crowdness, pollution, and poor management failed to produce any significant impacts in the decision making process of wilderness area visit.

Future demand projections reported in this paper indicate a steady increase in demand for outdoor recreational opportunities in U.S. regions where BLM lands are located. From a supply perspective, BLM lands represent "prime targets" for meeting increased recreational demand in the western U.S. The BLM will face the challenge of balancing increased recreation use with other multiple uses, and minimizing the negative environmental impacts of increased recreation use such as damages caused by motorized vehicles, horses and foot traffic. In the future, the BLM will also face management challenges related to financing the provision of increased recreational opportunities.

In 1994 and 1995, the National Survey on Recreation and the Environment (NSRE) interviewed approximately 17,000 Americans over age 15 in random-digit-dialing telephone samplings. The primary purpose of the project was to learn about the outdoor recreation activities of people over age 15 in the United States. They were asked about their participation in 81 specific recreation activities.