Factors affecting overall satisfaction with a river recreation experience

Visitor satisfaction has been a consistently stated goal of outdoor recreation management. Recreation resource managers provide opportunities for the visiting public with the anticipation of satisfying the needs of the visitors. Management efforts are often evaluated in terms of visitor satisfaction. In the recent decade, a multiple satisfactions approach has been the primary research paradigm guiding visitor satisfaction research. This paradigm has focused primarily upon behavioral-type dimensions such as crowding, goal attainment, and resource impacts resulting from behavior. The purpose of this study was to examine the importance of a setting dimension relative to behavioral-type dimensions for explaining differences in visitor satisfaction. A sample of 895 river visitors were sent a questionnaire in the mail; 682 were returned for a 76.2% response rate. Regression analysis indicated the setting dimension was ranked as one of the most important dimensions for explaining differences in visitor satisfaction. Other dimensions considered included group behavior, perceived crowding, parking, past experience, encounters, use levels, and time waiting. Implications for management are discussed.     

OPTIMAL ALLOCATION OF WATER QUALITY CONTROLS IN URBANIZING RIVER BASINS1

ABSTRACT: Urbanizing river basins in the west are encountering serious water quality degradation resulting from the expanded water utilization. In order to avoid aggravating such conditions, water quality controls need to be implemented. The important questions are, therefore, where and how to impose such constraints on the urban and agricultural sectors to achieve the desired level of pollution control. An application of the model developed to address such questions is made in the Utah Lake drainage area of Central Utah as a test of the model's utility. The region is subdivided into five major sub-basins containing both municipal and agricultural water demands. A submodel of each sub-basin is developed which optimizes the water quality control strategies by linking the urban to the agricultural uses and then evaluating the levels of control for each sector. From these results, a cost-effectiveness function for each sub-basin is generated. By jointly considering the cost-effectiveness relationship for each sub-basin, an optimum policy for the entire basin is determined.     

WATER SUPPLY,TREATMENT, DISTRUBTION,AND REUSE OPTIMIZATION IN ARID URBAN AREAS1

ABSTRACT: A Management level model has been formulated in which a system analysis format is employed to answer some of the basic questions regarding urban water management strategies The model incorporates a multilevel optimization scheme to coordinate urban water supply, distribution, and wastewater management. A test of the model's utility is made in an application to the water management problems of the Denver, Colorado metropolitan area. Denver has utilized both agricultural transfers and transmountain diversions to supplement the natural stream resources of the South Platte River. Although plans are being made to increase the capacity of these sources, increasingly stringent standards on the area's effluents are enhancing the feasibility of reclaiming and recycling a portion of the wastewater. The urban model used in this study indicates the decision points at which respective strategies are introduced. However, by formulating the model from a planner's viewpoint, the most important results gained from the analysis are the costs of various institutional constraints which may restrict the decision maker's ability to implement optimal policies.     

Bound residues: environmental solution or future problem?

The paper examines the issue of bound residues from the viewpoint of the risk assessment procedures employed for environmental protection. It considers, on one hand, the evidence that such residues are so tightly bound to soil organic matter as to be essentially unavailable; and on the other, the perspective that we should not be loading up the environment with compounds whose future behaviour and release we cannot predict. Existing knowledge of the mechanisms by which residues bind to soil organic matter suggests that release will be closely dependent on soil organic matter breakdown. Simple models of organic matter turnover suggest that the release following single applications of individual compounds will be very slow; but the significance of releases following repeated application over many years of a number of compounds needs to be investigated further. Applying environmental risk assessment techniques is complicated by the difficulty in identifying parent molecules and potential metabolites in the bound residue fraction. The paper concludes that for single additions of individual compounds, bound residues probably do represent an environmental solution. But the long-term significance of bound residues formed from multiple additions of a number of compounds is less clear. The paper recommends that future work should emphasise the biological significance of such residues and their release.     

Towards informed decisions about prenatal testing: A review

There are now several well-documented psychological problems associated with prenatal testing programmes. These include poor understanding of tests undergone or declined, anxiety following false positive results, and false reassurance in those receiving negative test results. There is, as yet, little evidence concerning how to provide services to circumvent these. The focus of this review is upon just one of these problems: how best to inform women about prenatal testing and their reproductive options following the diagnosis of a fetal abnormality. Possible methods of improving informed decision-making either about whether to undergo testing or whether to terminate an affected pregnancy are described drawing upon research from antenatal and other health care areas. Future challenges for clinical practice and research in this area concern the range of conditions and predispositions for which prenatal testing with the option of termination should be offered.     

Prenatal diagnosis of chromosome mosaicism

The frequency of mosaicism and pseudomosaicism in the prenatal diagnosis of cytogenetic disorders is reported, based on 3000 pregnancies studied in our laboratory. Diagnosis of true mosaicism was only made when an abnomality was detected in two or more independent cultures established from an amniotic fluid sample. On this basis, 0.37 per cent of all cases were diagnosed as true mosaics. 1.07 per cent of all cases had pseudomosaicism involving more than one cell from the same culture with an identical abnormality. 4.13 per cent of cases had a single abnormal cell with an extra chromosome, loss of a sex chromosome (or part of a sex chromosome), or translocation. Details of the outcome and follow-up of cases is given. Particularly problematical were cases where multiple cells from one culture contained an abnormality which could have been clinically significant. A crude estimate of the extent to which true mosaicism might currently be misinterpreted as pseudomosaicism or entirely missed has been made, based on data from the U.S. survey (Hsu and Perlis, in press). It was concluded that even when two, and if necessary a third culture is extensively analysed with an average of 24 cells per culture counted, at least 4.5 per cent of cases of true mosaicism may be completely missed and at least 7 per cent could be misdiagnosed as pseudomosaicism. There is an urgent need for improved laboratory techniques which allow growth of a greater number of cell colonies and therefore a more broadly based analysis. Detailed long term follow-up of prenatally diagnosed mosaics is also essential for assessing the clinical significance of the laboratory findings.     

The impact of the Clean Development Mechanism on developing countries’ commitment to mitigate climate change and its implications for the future

The objective of this paper is to examine the mitigation of climate change using the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) from the perspective of developing countries. The effects of the CDM on developing countries’ efforts to reduce greenhouse gases (GHGs) pledged under the Paris Agreement (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change [UNFCCC], 21st Conference of the Parties, Paris, France) are investigated. Data analysis reveals that the intensive hosting of CDM projects and the resultant higher marginal abatement costs led to fewer efforts by developing countries to mitigate climate change. A theoretical model from the literature of “low-hanging fruits” is applied to determine if rising prices of the CDM can be expected in the future. The results indicate that the benefits for developing countries must increase so as to keep the CDM attractive for them in an environment where they also have reduction commitments. To further ensure the effectiveness of the CDM under the Paris Agreement, policy should ensure that developing countries actually charge higher prices and, at the same time, contribute adequately to the global goal of GHG reductions. To this end, developing countries should be permitted to demand benefits that lie outside the current scope of the CDM, and non-compliance with their climate targets should also be sanctioned. In addition, fostering sustainable development should become more attractive for developed countries without the CDM, e.g., through sustainability labels, so as to reduce the trade-off for developing countries between the benefits of the CDM and compliance with their commitments to mitigate climate change.

     

Unruly pathogens: eliciting values for environmental risk in the context of heterogeneous expert knowledge

This paper examines some of the theoretical and methodological issues arising from the process of conceptualising and eliciting values for environmental risk in the context of heterogeneous expert knowledge. Drawing on the experience of a recent research project examining the relationship between livestock farming systems and microbial watercourse pollution the paper reflects critically upon efforts to develop an interdisciplinary assessment of the factors that may affect the loss of potential pathogens from agricultural land to water courses as the basis for targeting high risk fields and farms. The paper describes the procedures for designing the natural and cultural parameters that surround microbial risks and the issues that are raised for making whole system assessments workable based on contrasting and unstable systems of disciplinary insight. Situated within claims about the need for generating reliable and widely applicable assessments of environmental risk the paper suggests that interdisciplinary working raises important issues about the role of ‘uncertain’ knowledge in the management of ‘known’ risks.     

Mind the gap: institutional considerations for gender-inclusive climate change policy in Sub-Saharan Africa

This paper positions climate change against the backdrop of gender, premised on the understanding that neither climate change impacts nor responses are gender neutral, therefore institutions need to respond accordingly. Institutions play a central role in facilitating policy effects and forming major nodes of interaction as well as determining the accentuation of risk. Drawing on examples from different parts of Sub-Saharan Africa, the paper seeks to elucidate why women should be placed at the heart of climate change interventions. Establishing the appropriate connections between gender and climate change will enhance the opportunities for problem-solving and can increase the efficiency and effectiveness of policy-making. The gendered aspects of climate change and environmental relations are analysed by using an African feminist approach as the theoretical framework to expand and expound upon this position. This paper also investigates institutional matters pertaining to the management of environmental resources and highlights some of the constraints that need to be overcome in order to ensure the inclusion and empowerment of women in the management of these resources. It concludes by calling for a thorough understanding of the gender-based power relations in the agendas and activities of environmental governance institutions at all levels in society.     

The Effect of Reformulated Gasoline on Ambient Carbon Monoxide Concentrations in Southeastern Wisconsin

Abstract

Reformulated gasoline (RFG) contains oxygen additives such as methyl tertiary butyl ether or ethanol. The additives enable vehicles to burn fuel with a higher air/fuel ratio, thereby lowering the emission of carbon monoxide (CO) and volatile organic compounds (VOCs). Because VOCs react with sunlight to form ozone (O₃), the Clean Air Act requires severe O₃ nonattainment areas such as southeastern Wisconsin to use RFG. On July 17, 2001, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) granted Milwaukee, WI, and Chicago, IL, a waiver from the VOC reduction requirement of Phase II RFG. The VOC reduction requirement was lowered from 27.4% of the 1990 baseline fuel to 25.4%. The assumption was that ethanol-blended RFG would lower summertime CO concentrations sufficiently to offset the increased VOC emissions. The waiver is estimated to increase VOC emissions by ～0.8%, or 0.4 t of VOC on a hot summer weekday. This study evaluates whether RFG has been effective in lowering southeastern Wisconsin ambient CO concentrations. Three years of ambient CO data before RFG was introduced were compared with the first three years of ambient CO data after RFG was introduced. This paper also evaluates how the meteorology, vehicle inspection/maintenance program, vehicle miles traveled, and stationary source emissions influence CO concentrations. The winter decrease in ambient CO concentrations was found to be statistically significant, while the summer data showed no statistically significant change, indicating that RFG is most effective lowering ambient CO concentrations in cold weather.