Page 147 - A bird’s-eye view of recreation - Rogier Pouwels

Appendix 3 Description of three potential management interventions used to assess the impact of possible management actions on the Nightjar population (Chapter 2)
The model was used to assess three potential management interventions that alter the capacity and use levels of the car parks. The capacities were based on the input maps of the car parks and the use levels were based on the local knowledge of the site managers. The current capacities and use levels were altered by the researches to simulate the three interventions and illustrate the potential of the model. The total number of visitors to the New Forest (13.3 million; Gallagher et al. 2007) were distributed over the car parks based on the combination of their capacity and use level.
The three potential management interventions are:
• Closing small car parks: All car parks with a capacity of less than 20 cars
were considered closed. This resulted in the closure of 45 car parks and a redistribution of less than 10% of all visitors over the other car parks. Visitors that were expected to start from these 45 car parks in the current situation were redistributed in proportion to the number of visitors starting at the other car parks. Closing down small car parks may be expected to result in larger areas that are disturbance free.
• Focus on suitable areas: Three relatively isolated car parks located near areas with many Nightjars were considered closed. Visitors from these three car parks were redistributed to five surrounding car parks in proportion to the capacity of these car parks. The three car parks are Andrews Mare, Yew Tree Heath and Moonhills. It was expected that this scenario would have the highest impact per redistributed visitor as the measures focus on areas that are suitable for Nightjar.
• Concentrate visitors in a small part of the area: All but 20 car parks were considered closed. All visitors were distributed over these 20 car parks evenly. The total number of visitors that start their trip from these car parks corresponds to the two car parks that are used most in the current situation, Bolderwood and Wilverley Inclosure. This most extreme intervention was expected to concentrate visitors in a small part of the area, resulting in large undisturbed areas and an increase in population size of Nightjar.
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Appendices
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