Section 6 Recreation 



FINDINGS AND RECOMMENDATIONS 



A. Introduction 



Outdoor recreation is becoming a massive rush 

 to the water. Even today, recreation ranks at least 

 a close second to the offshore oil and gas industry 

 in economic importance in marine areas. Shore 

 areas provide the conventional recreation activities 

 of swimming, fishing, and boating. Scuba diving 

 and surfing have become major activities. Addi- 

 tionally, new technologies will make saturation 

 diving in underwater manned habitats and the use 

 of recreational submarines commonplace in future 

 years. 



Existing and future recreation uses of coastal 

 areas raise major problems. These revolve around 

 the difficulty of obtaining information on which 

 to base policy decisions, of obtaining access to 

 coastal areas for recreation purposes, and of 

 managing recreation programs to achieve optimum 

 benefits and safety. 



B. Supply 



Shoreline development for industrial, commer- 

 cial, and a variety of other purposes is decreasing 

 access to the shore while the demand for recrea- 

 tion is inexorably increasing. The Bureau of 

 Outdoor Recreation estimates that there are 1 ,200 

 mUes of shore frontage in the public domain 

 reserved for recreation; future demand for 2,800 

 miles of frontage is forecast. There is no adequate 

 information as to potential recreation resources 

 from the private sector. In fact there is a general 

 paucity of hard data on which to base policy 

 decisions. 



Existing publicly held properties are often 

 distant from urban areas where the population is 

 expanding most rapidly. The Department of De- 

 fense and other agencies have coastal facilities that 

 could be opened to the public for recreational 

 purposes, at least on weekends and holidays. The 

 feasibility of creating new shoreline through exca- 

 vation has not been explored. 



Recommendation : 



A definitive inventory of existing publicly and 

 privately-owned public recreational facilities and 

 of potential resources in coastal areas should be 

 undertaken immediately to provide a basis for 

 realistically appraising the needs for new resources. 

 This should encompass a survey of publicly-held 

 restricted shoreline areas to determine what areas 

 could be opened to the public for recreational 

 purposes, at least on weekends and holidays. 



C. Obtaining Access 



Existing publicly-held properties can never ac- 

 commodate the pressures for marine recreation. 

 Consequently, there must be emphasis on obtain- 

 ing access to the shoreline, particularly near urban 

 areas, through such devices as zoning, easements, 

 use permits, and when necessary, through land 

 acquisition. Regulatory devices and land acquisi- 

 tion should be guided by the uses contemplated in 

 the comprehensive plans developed by the State 

 coastal zone authorities. 



Urban renewal and port development provide 

 an opportunity to restore waterfronts accessible to 

 urban residents for purposes of recreation. In plan- 

 ning new port facilities, for example, provision 

 could be made for observational galleries and 

 educational exhibits enabling the public to view 

 dock-side operations. As the new transportation 

 technologies render ports excess, some of them 

 could be converted to facilities for coastal recrea- 

 tion. 



One possible device to lessen the immediate 

 outlay for land acquisition is to use discount 

 bonds instead of the conventional interest-bearing 

 bonds. The interest under the former arrangement 

 is paid at maturity and a State or municipality 

 could thereby defer raising the tax rate to finance 

 iaterest payments. 



Recommendation : 



Federal, State, and local governments should give 

 primary emphasis to acquiring access to the shores 

 for purposes of recreation, especially near urban 



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