ESTIMATING REVENUE-CAPTURE POTENTIAL ASSOCIATED WITH PUBLIC AREA RECREATION

A traditional contingent valuation approach and the “"trip response method"” were examined as potential techniques for measuring public area recreation revenue-capture potential. Empirical results suggest that both methods are useful for assessing revenue-capture potential. Additional research on alternative methods for assessing recreation revenue-capture potential is encouraged.Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

A PROPOSED METHODOLOGY FOR ESTIMATING ECOREGIONAL VALUES FOR OUTDOOR RECREATION IN THE UNITED STATES

This paper provides a methodology for the estimation of recreational demand functions and values using an ecoregional approach. Ten ecoregions in the continental US were defined based on similarly functioning ecosystem characters. The individual travel cost method was employed to estimate the recreational demand functions for activities such as motorboating and waterskiing, developed and primative camping, coldwater fishing, sightseeing and pleasure driving, and big game hunting for each ecoregions. Estimates of per trip net income value range from $12.93 to$218.38 while per day estimates range from $4.31 to$109.19. While our ecoregional approach differs conceptually from previous work, our results appear consistent with the previous travel cost method valuation studies. (Missing tables 1,2,3,4,5 and 6)Recreation, ecoregion, travel cost method, truncated poisson model, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Beginning at the end: The outcome spaces framework to guide purposive transdisciplinary research

© 2014 The Authors. The framework presented in this paper offers an alternative starting point for transdisciplinary research projects seeking to create change. The framework begins at the end: it distinguishes three distinct 'transdisciplinary outcome spaces' and proposes articulating their content for purposive transdisciplinary research projects. Defining upfront the desired improvements has profound implications for how transdisciplinary research is conceived, designed, implemented and evaluated.Three key realms of transdisciplinary outcome spaces are distinguished - situation, knowledge, and learning - and elaborated: (1) an improvement within the 'situation' or field of inquiry; (2) the generation of relevant stocks and flows of knowledge, including scholarly knowledge and other societal knowledge forms, and making those insights accessible and meaningful to researchers, participants and beneficiaries; and (3) mutual and transformational learning by researchers and research participants to increase the likelihood of persistent change.Positioning the framework in the field of transdisciplinary literature reveals that much of the contestation concerning transdisciplinary research and practice may be attributable to the diverse but implicit ontological and epistemological perspectives inhabited by transdisciplinary researchers, leading to a call for more reflexive and explicit attention to these and other formative influences (i.e. sources of funding, project motivation, or locus of power)

THE USE OF PRIVATE LANDS IN THE U.S. FOR OUTDOOR RECREATION: RESULTS OF A NATIONWIDE SURVEY

Land Economics/Use, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

EFFECTS OF RESERVOIR AQUATIC PLANT MANAGEMENT ON RECREATIONAL EXPENDITURES AND REGIONAL ECONOMIC ACTIVITY

Exotic aquatic plant management is a major concern for public reservoir management in many regions of the United States. A study was conducted to measure the effects of alternative aquatic plant management strategies on recreational expenditures and regional economic activity. The study areas was Lake Guntersville, Alabama, and the local economy surrounding the lake. Lake Guntersville is one of the largest reservoirs in the Tennessee Valley Authority system. Results suggested the relatively moderate levels of aquatic plant control are associated with the highest levels of recreation-related economic effects on the economy surrounding Lake Guntersville.Aquatic plants, Input-output analysis, Public reservoir management, Recreational expenditures, Regional economic activity, Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

PROFILE OF PARTICIPANTS IN FISH AND WILDLIFE RELATED OUTDOOR RECREATIONAL ACTIVITIES IN THE UNITED STATES

Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Less is More? Publicness, Management Strategy, and Organizational Performance in Mental Health Treatment Facilities

In this study, the authors seek to identify mechanisms of publicness present within mental health treatment facilities and, subsequently, explore the constraints these mechanisms impose on facilities’ capacities to achieve public outcomes. Through grounded insights from senior managers in this field, political authority, namely through governmental funding and regulation, is identified by 43 of 46 respondents as being an influence on publicness. Authors then uncover the conditions during which publicness, in the form of political authority, constrains organizational achievement of public outcomes. In leveraging managerial perspectives, two distinct constraints emerged: publicness often inhibits organizational efficiency and produces mission drift within these facilities. Findings suggest that managers, under certain conditions (and where legally feasible), may provide greater effectiveness in fulfilling organizational goals and objectives and in achieving public outcomes by maintaining or decreasing an organization’s publicness. Fundamental to effectively managing publicness is understanding the mechanisms germane to both public outcome attainment and failure—the latter of which is explored here

AN ANALYSIS OF WILLINGNESS TO PARTICIPATE IN WILDERNESS OR OTHER PRIMITIVE AREAS

A logit model was used to determine the major factors explaining willingness to participate of an individual in the wilderness or other primitive area visits. The results of the study showed that education and environmental awareness were in wilderness participation decision. Demographic variables like age, race, and sex also were statistically significant and emerged as important policy variables in defining wilderness participation behavior. Characteristics of wilderness areas like crowdness, pollution, and poor management failed to produce any significant impacts in the decision making process of wilderness area visit.wilderness or other primitive area visits, policy variables, demographic characteristics, participation behavior, Consumer/Household Economics,

OUTDOOR RECREATION TRENDS AND MARKET OPPORTUNITIES IN THE UNITED STATES

In 1994 and 1995, the National Survey of Recreation and Environment (NSRE) was accomplished by interviewing approximately 17,000 Americans over age 15 in random-digit-dialing telephone samplings. The primary purpose was to learn about the outdoor recreation activities of people over age 15 in the United States. They were asked about their participation in 62 specific recreation activities.Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

Crystal structure and RNA binding of the Rpb4/Rpb7 subunits of human RNA polymerase II

The Rpb4 and Rpb7 subunits of eukaryotic RNA polymerase II (RNAP(II)) form a heterodimer that protrudes from the 10-subunit core of the enzyme. We have obtained crystals of the human Rpb4/Rpb7 heterodimer and determined the structure to 2.7 Å resolution. The presence of putative RNA-binding domains on the Rpb7 subunit and the position of the heterodimer close to the RNA exit groove in the 12 subunit yeast polymerase complex strongly suggests a role for the heterodimer in binding and stabilizing the nascent RNA transcript. We have complemented the structural analysis with biochemical studies directed at dissecting the RNA-binding properties of the human Rpb4/Rpb7 complex and that of the homologous E/F complex from Methanocaldococcus jannaschii. A number of conserved, solvent-exposed residues in both the human Rpb7 subunit and the archaeal E subunit have been modified by site-directed mutagenesis and the mutants tested for RNA binding by performing electrophoretic mobility shift assays. These studies have identified an elongated surface region on the corresponding face of both subunit E and Rpb7 that is involved in RNA binding. The area spans the nucleic acid binding face of the OB fold, including the B4–B5 loop, but also extends towards the N-terminal domain