Table 2.7.6-5— Projected Vessel Trips for Deep-Draft Traffic 



Vessel type ' 



Current 

 year ' 



Base 

 year ^ 



Years Year 10 Year 20 Year- Year- Year end '^^^nulf 



With proiect 



Without project 



' Show projected vessel trips by type of vessel and total for project life. 



^ Study year 



^ First year of project benefits. 



Section VIII— NED Benefit Evaluation 

 Procedures: Recreation 



2.8.1 Introduction. 



This section provides the procedures for evaluat- 

 ing the beneficial and adverse effects of water pro- 

 ject recreation on national econonnic development 

 (NED). The Federal Water Project Recreation Act 

 of 1965 (Pub. L. 89-72) requires that full considera- 

 tion be given to the opportunities that Federal multi- 

 ple-purpose and other water projects afford for out- 

 door recreation and associated fish and wildlife en- 

 hancement. 



2.8.2 Conceptual basis. 



(a) Genera/. (1) Benefits arising from recreation 

 opportunities created by a project are measured in 

 terms of willingness to pay. Benefits for projects (or 

 project features) that increase supply are measured 

 as the willingness to pay for each increment of 

 supply. Benefits for projects (or project features) 

 that alter willingness to pay (e.g., through quality 

 changes) are measured as the difference between 

 the without- and with-project willingness to pay. 

 Willingness to pay includes entry and use fees ac- 

 tually paid for site use plus any unpaid value (sur- 

 plus) enjoyed by consumers. (Payment for equip- 

 ment, food, transportation costs, or lodging associ- 

 ated with recreation activity cannot be used as 

 direct estimates of willingness to pay, because 

 these payments are not specifically for site use.) 

 The total willingness to pay is represented as the 

 area under the demand curve between the old and 

 new supply. Because most recreation is publicly 

 provided, it is usually not possible to estimate 

 demand directly from observed pnce-consumption 

 data. This section describes procedures for estimat- 

 ing use and willingness to pay by means of travel 



behavior, user surveys, and other quantifiable 

 measures. 



(2) Many proposed projects subject to NED 

 benefit-cost analysis involve both recreation gains 

 and recreation losses. For example, stream and 

 land-based recreation may be lost because of the 

 project, or recreation may be transferred to the pro- 

 posed site from a more distant site. Net recreation 

 benefits are the value of the gains minus the value 

 of the losses; benefits may be positive or negative. 

 Since reliable empirical methods for estimating will- 

 ingness to accept compensation for losses have 

 not been developed, measures of willingness to 

 pay are used to value both gains and losses. Evalu- 

 ation procedures should be based on sound eco- 

 nomic rationale and have an empirical basis that 

 permits an objective and reproducible analysis of 

 benefits and costs. 



(b) Criteria for an acceptable evaluation proce- 

 dure. An acceptable evaluation procedure has the 

 following characteristics: 



(1) Evaluation is based on an empirical estimate 

 of demand applied to the particular project. 



(2) Estimates of demand reflect the socioeco- 

 nomic characteristics of market area populations, 

 qualitative characteristics of the recreation re- 

 sources under study, and characteristics of alterna- 

 tive existing recreation opportunities. 



(3) Evaluation accounts for the value of losses or 

 gains to existing sites in the study area affected by 

 the project (without-project condition). 



(4) Willingness to pay projections over time are 

 based on projected changes in underlying determi- 

 nants of demand. 



(c) Description of evaluation metfiods. The proce- 

 dures described in this section and its appendices 

 incorporate three evaluation methods. They are the 

 travel cost method (TCM), contingent valuation 

 method (CVM), and unit day value (UDV) method. 



67 



