Which Visitors Can Be Tracked on Public Lands Using Social Media?
"Seems like everyone is on social media these days. But statistically speaking ... are they? As land managers move to using electronic data as a cost-effective way to figure out who is visiting parks and protected areas, some questions remain: How accurately does geotagged data reflect visitors compared to traditional on-the-ground counts?
New research from IORT doctoral student Hongchao Zhang and his team work toward answering that question. They used nine years of geotagged social media posts uploaded to Flickr and Panoramio to determine the ability of social media to measure and map movements of visitors in national parks, national forests and state parks in Utah. Their analysis showed great results for how geotagged data reflected numbers gathered through traditional means--data collected from Panoramio and Flickr accurately reflected visitation to outdoor recreation and tourism destinations.
However, they noticed some differences in the accuracy of places managed by different agencies in Utah. Results from data taken at National Park Service units and national forests were on target, while data taken from state parks returned with more variability. What's going on? The difference could be attributed to several things, Zhang said. First, while the National Park Service and the USDA Forest Service use detailed visitor use monitoring systems, state parks employ a different strategy--they tabulate visitors based on the annual revenues generated within each park. This introduces the potential for inaccurate estimates of park visitation when other factors influence revenues generated through entrance fees and license sales (like the state's economy).
Second, visitors to state parks are looking through their phone cameras at different kinds of views. Several Utah State Park units feature cultural and historical sites, courthouses and state homes, which are much less likely to be photographed and shared on social media platforms preferred by outdoor enthusiasts, creating a blip in the geo-tagged strategy.
The use of social media should be approached with caution, Zhang said, with an appreciation that while it may have many benefits relative to traditional visitor use monitoring methods, it may not be appropriate in all contexts and for all questions."