Assessing Tourists' Multi-Attribute Preferences for Public Beach Access

Abstract

Because of the limited capacity of coastal lands and conflicting interests among stakeholders of the coastal resources, there are intensifying pressures to retain and provide more public access to the coast. Under limited development opportunities and budget constraints, identifying tourists' preferences for management options is highly important for management agencies to better serve coastal tourists. The purpose of this article is to better understand tourists' preferences for management options and policies related to public beach access. A stated preference choice method is used to identify the extent of coastal tourists' concern about current beach management programs and support for prospective management actions related to public beach access. Results provide management agencies with a comprehensive understanding of tourists' preferences for management attributes, as well as willingness to make tradeoffs among the attributes. The article concludes with a discussion of beach management implications and future research that will benefit beach management.