Monitoring MPA visitor uses handbook

5.3.5 Example of a managementmeasureBy quantifying visitor flows along the MPA's roads andpaths, it is possible for example to identify and locatedaily visitor peaks. This data is used by managers to planfor any facility saturation problems (parking areas, paths,etc.) or to highlight significant visitor flows near environment-sensitivezones (quiet zones for wildlife, nestingsites, etc.).The importance of coordinated protocols invisitor use monitoring: the example of Parcsnationaux de France(L. Chabanis, Parcs nationaux de France)National parks in France began conducting studiesto estimate visitor numbers in 1996. The studies aredone once every five years and in 2001, inter-park dataprocessing became possible, using qualitative visitorinformation. For the 2011 counting campaign, theprotocols were standardised between all the NationalParks and were assessed by statisticians.During the 2011 summer season (from June to Septemberfor Metropolitan France and from December to Marchfor overseas regions), quantitative and qualitative datawas collected based on a common protocol combiningautomatic counts on roads and paths and visual countson paths and car parks.Visual counts in parking areas can be use to determinea coefficient of the number of people per vehicle to turna number of vehicles obtained by road counts into anumber of visits. The National Parks' marine areas werealso taken into consideration.For the first time, both qualitative and quantitativevisitor data relating to different protected areas can beprocessed.20%16%12%8%4%0%01 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23Cévennes Écrins Guadeloupe Réunion VanoiseFigure 9 : Comparison of visitor flows in core areas of five French NationalParks over 23 days in the 2011 high season.5.4 Mooring area use indicatorMooring area use monitoring onPorquerolles(Port-Cros National Park, France)Porquerolles Island (1,254 hectares) is part of thearchipelago of the islands of Hyères, along with Port-Cros and the Levant islands. Accessible in just a fewminutes by passenger boats and located in the heart ofa particularly active boating area, Porquerolles attractssignificant tourist numbers estimated at one millionvisitors per year.Port-Cros National Park, which ensures the protectionof the island’s natural habitats and land and sea areas,decided to carry out a visitor monitoring project in 2002to obtain precise data about people visiting the land andmarine parts of Porquerolles and Port-Cros. Created in2003, the Bountîles observatory (Base d'Observation desUsages Nautiques et Terrestres des Îles et des Littoraux)conducts quantitative and qualitative monitoring ofvisitors to the two islands.In Porquerolles, boat numbers are monitored for theharbour by manual counts and yacht-night data obtainedfrom the harbour master; for mooring areas, numbers areobtained by aerial views taken during ULM overflights.The monitoring protocol applied since 2005 includes twooverflights per summer season. These flights are doneby a professional pilot and photographer who then sendthe photos to the National Park for processing. Oneoverflight of Porquerolles provides a set of approximately90 photographs to be located and analysed by hand (cf.next page photo). On each view, the boats are located,characterised (yacht/motor boat/inflatable, etc.) andmeasured (less than 6 metres, 6-10 metres, etc.) topopulate an Access database linked to a layer of spatialdata delimiting previously identified mooring areas (cf.figure 10).The 2002 study counted a maximum of 1,712 boats inthe mooring area and the harbour, on 18 August 2002(vs. a maximum of 341 in Port-Cros, on 16 August 2002).With an average of 4.2 people on board, the numberof recreational boaters travelling to Porquerolles Islandis close to, or even higher on very busy days, than thenumber of people arriving by the passenger boats! Themonitoring done by overflight between 2003 and 2011 didnot reveal any significant increase in boat numbers (cf.figure 11). The result must, however, be weighted with thefact that the overflights are often scheduled with the pilotseveral weeks in advance and do not always take placeon peak days.... TABLE OF CONTENTS 23 COLLECTION VISITOR USE OBSERVATION AND MONITORING IN MEDITERRANEAN MARINE PROTECTED AREAS