Conflict Resolution in Alaska: From Theory to Practice
In the seventeen years since the Exxon Valdez oil spill (EVOS), Prince William Sound has experienced numerous changes.
The spill itself impacted and disrupted the resources and human services in the Sound. For example, recreation and tourism services were redistributed from oil impacted areas of the Sound to areas that had previously experienced little use. However, in addition to the spill, the Sound has experienced increased human activity over the last decade.
The growth of the recreation and tourism sector statewide has been accompanied by improved access to the Sound. In the western Sound in particular, the opening of the Whittier access road has led to both increased personal and commercial use. There is growing concern within the federal agencies mandated to oversee the management of this landscape that increased competition and rapid growth in sport hunting and fishing, both commercial and private, as well as ongoing subsistence activities may be threatening the ability of the resource to sustain such use. Of equal concern is whether the wilderness experiences that Alaskans and visitors are seeking are not also being threatened. As recreational use levels increase in PWS (eg. kayaking, wildlife viewing, pleasure boating, hunting, fishing, camping etc.) it is inevitable that encounter levels and associated impacts will increase, visitor conflicts will arise and native Alaskans will be displaced from traditional harvest areas.
As part of a three year study the University of Arizona, School of Natural Resources and Environment has been cooperatively working with the Chugach National Forest (CNF), it’s stakeholders and GeoDimensions Inc. from Australia to gain an understanding of the spatial and temporal patterns of recreation use and visitor volumes while ensuring that the visitor experience meets an appropriate standard of quality. A baseline model from several years of data collection provides a good indication of patterns of dispersed use levels across the Sound and points to some activity hotspots where a variety of stakeholder conflicts have arisen. Integral to this study has been to critically evaluate encounter standards that have already been established under the 2002 Forest Plan for maintaining a high quality experience and to ensure these management standards are consistent with the type of dispersed visitor use levels occurring now as well as into the future.
As part of the final phase of this project, the research team is employing a series of conflict resolution workshops to be held with stakeholder groups in Anchorage, Cordova and Valdez, Alaska this November. These workshops will unveil a new spatial conflict resolution technique developed in conjunction with GeoDimension Inc., referred to as Level of Sustainable Activity (LSA). LSA is a conflict resolution framework for evaluating the relationships between quality of service, LSA levels and visitor density for recreation use. This framework has recently been successfully applied to evaluate a number of water-based recreation projects in Australia for defining the relationship between traffic densities and the safety and satisfaction of users, and the impact on bank erosion from a user’s perspective.
This work will be piloted in Alaska in focus group sessions with representatives of commercial, private, subsistence use and other groups as necessary. LSA focus group workshops will be used to collect preferences and views of the main user groups of the Sound about existing and future visitor use levels and campsite facilities. The LSA workshops will ask the Sound users to rate existing peak and maximum tolerable density levels of use on the land and water.
LSA focus groups will be conducted using a risk-management approach to elicit risks of increasing use to quality of experience, safety, environmental, social and economic impacts for each LSA class. Results of these workshops will provide specific information on user densities and whether they correlate with quality of experience. In addition, level of service indicators will provide valuable information and recommendations for managers of the Sound. Management recommendations will be specific to each management zone and will address existing level of use, whether this level of use exceeds quality of service standards for recreation, safety, environment, social and economic criteria and management alternatives that include use levels, safety, environmental, social and economic risks.
This project adds depth to our understanding of human values in conflicting landscapes and helps to unearth the exact nature of user-resource experiences on the ground and evaluates the potential for conflict between user groups. It also provides an excellent opportunity to assess the recovery of the recreation and tourism human service, and paths the way to sustainable tourism growth in the Sound.
For more information contact Randy Gimblett at gimblett@ag.arizona.edu.
