Table 3.— Total number of parties and percentage registration by type of user group for 

 three trails combined^ 



Overnight Day 



Hikers Horse Hikers Horse 



Sign No. of Per- No. of Per- No. of Per- No. of Per- 



treatment parties cent parties cent parties cent parties cent 



OSNL 40 83 20 20 42 64 8 25 



OSOL 60 57 5 20 124 23 7 



NSNL 52 88 41 56 31 65 7 14 



NSOL 38 76 20 45 57 44 11 9 



''Statistical significance, tested by y}: 



1. Overnight hikers by treatment (x2 = 16.9, df = 3, p<0.001) 



2. Overnight horse by treatment (^=ZZ, df = 3, p<0.04) 



3. Day hil<ers by treatment (x2 = 34.4, df = 3, p<0.001) 



4. Day horse by treatment (NA). 



Overnight Horse Users 



Overnight horse users responded well to the new sign 

 farther up the trail, with a 56 percent registration rate. 

 The old sign up the trail did not do as well (20 percent). 

 The old sign at the trailhead also elicited only 20 percent 

 compliance from a small sample, compared to 45 percent 

 for the new sign at the trailhead. Registration rate is 

 clearly affected by design of the station for this particu- 

 lar user tjTDe. 



Overnight Hikers 



Overnight hikers had the highest registration rates of 

 any user group. Eighty-eight percent complied with the 

 new sign up the trail, with 83 percent registering at the 

 old sign in the same location. Even the two sign combi- 

 nations at the trailhead received acceptable registration 

 rates. Seventy-six percent registered at the new sign and 

 57 percent complied at the original sign. With only 

 5 percent difference between the two best ranked combi- 

 nations, it appears that location is a more important fac- 

 tor than design in attracting better registration rates 

 from overnight hikers. 



CONCLUSIONS AND MANAGEMENT 

 IMPLICATIONS 



For all user categories, it is interesting that the old 

 sign and trailhead location ranked last. Any modification 

 of the current system appears to improve visitor compli- 

 ance, and the best system, the new sign at the new loca- 

 tion, was over twice as effective as the current system. 

 Perhaps visitors noticed more managerial interest 

 reflected in station maintenance, which improved their 

 perception of the usefulness of the information they 

 provided. The new sign was more visible and simply 

 may have attracted more attention. Location, however, 

 generally appeaired to have the strongest influence on 

 compliance. 



Location is clearly important for achieving useful 

 registration rates. Locations up the trail may elicit 

 desired response because visitors are now ready to stop. 

 This highlights how important location choice is when 

 establishing sites. Visitors also may have discharged 



some of the pretrip energy and can now think of other 

 things besides loading up and getting on the trail. 



The sign and its message influenced visitor registration, 

 but not generally as strongly as location. It appears the 

 brief "please register" is almost as effective as the more 

 detailed message, perhaps because visitors were ready to 

 register. Nevertheless, the importance of the message 

 and sign design cannot be underestimated, because user 

 groups respond differently. For example, the new sign 

 up the trail received a 56 percent registration rate from 

 overnight horse users. This is 36 percent higher than 

 that from the old sign in the same location, and may re- 

 sult from horse users identifying with the horse user in 

 the picture, as suggested by the relatively high rate for 

 the new sign at the old location. Improving the rate to 

 56 percent can be valuable to managers. At this level, 

 expanding the use figures can produce acceptably relia- 

 ble estimates suitable for workload planning. 



By manipulating sign and location, overnight hikers, 

 overnight horse users, and day hikers were induced to 

 register at rates sufficient for reliable use estimates. The 

 small sample of day horse users responded poorly, and 

 thus their significance in the visitor impact pattern must 

 be examined. During the entire study period, day horse 

 parties accounted for less than 6 percent of the visitor 

 parties. At such low percentages, managers may decide 

 to g£iin information about them through other monitor- 

 ing techniques. Cameras, field counts, and the like, are 

 all useful alternative methods to registration stations, 

 and may provide cheaper, more useful information. Con- 

 versely, hikers comprised 77 percent of the observed vis- 

 itor parties, over half of which were day users. Failure to 

 register half of this group would be a serious loss of 

 data. 



If registration stations are to be used, one must allow 

 sufficient time to select good sites. Many factors, large 

 and small, must be considered. For this study, two peo- 

 ple spent a half day examining possible sites and select- 

 ing the best one. A good site, located farther up the trail 

 than a poorer one, may cost more to service, but may be 

 worth it in better information produced. Perhaps not all 

 trails need registers, at least for use measurement. 

 Registers placed along a few high-use trails may be all 

 that is needed to learn about most of the visitors to the 

 area. 



7 



