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 Following the PR-frame created by the recreation/tourism industry, public land managers are aggressively promoting "the Great Outdoors" as being a vital weapon in the "War on Childhood Obesity." The theory (or should I say, "the spin") is that with proper marketing and private investment, nature can be remade into something sufficiently enticing to lure children from their couches and game consoles. Of course, it won't any longer be "nature" but, as the recreation/tourism industry never stops saying, children don't really like or appreciate nature . As the industry has been saying for nearly three decades, "the Great Outdoors" must be transformed into something relevant to today's youth. In reality, and as I have said for a more than a decade, the recreation/tourism is using children in their effort takeover control of outdoor recreation on the public lands.
Curiously enough, the recreation/tourism lobbied hard to erect the recreation fee barrier between children and nature. Without the ability to charge and retain fees for recreation on federally managed public lands, the industry could never hope to profit from the transformation of nature into a venue for the consumption of wreckreational products, goods and service.
The result, of course, has been the growing disconnect between children and nature and perhaps even some proportion of the childhood obesity epidemic. I would be giving too much credibility to the recreation/tourism industry's spin if I were to suggest that there is more that a minor correlation between childhood obesity and the National Parks and forests. There are many factors involved and a much greater contributor to this problem is pay-to-play as applied to school sports!
In the USA, the response to this crisis has been to erect higher economic barriers. The governmental response has been to make public lands and public schools LESS public. The consequence has been that fewer children are getting exercise in natural, urban, and school settings.
Fortunately there are parts of the world where such idiocy is being questioned. Pasted below is an article from Canada in which the correct connections are drawn.
Scott
--- begin quoted ---
July 9th, 2008
Why do NBers pay for beach access?
By Mary Moszynski Times & Transcript Staff
FREDERICTON - Following a harsh winter and cool spring, New Brunswick has finally been hit with some hot weather.
And, like many Maritimers, residents are heading to a local beach to cool down and enjoy a swim.
But anyone heading to one of New Brunswick's 11 provincial parks might
want to check whether they will be charged a fee to access one of the
province's natural treasures.
Unlike Nova Scotia and Prince Edward Island, the New Brunswick
government charges an entrance fee to several of its provincial parks.
Gabriela Tymowski, who runs a clinic for overweight children at the
University of New Brunswick in Fredericton, said eliminating the fee
for provincial parks would send a strong message to New Brunswickers
about the importance of wellness and exercise.
"It would send a really good message and encourage people to get out
into the wildness," she said. "But the big question is whether those
parks are adequately resourced by the government to allow for that
increased number."
Tymowski said it's difficult to say whether the parks should be free as
there's a concern government hasn't invested heavily enough in the
parks to handle the extra capacity if more people started visiting the
sites.
New Brunswickers are often cited in studies as being among the fattest in the country.
"New Brunswick is one of Canada's best playgrounds -- we've got
incredible rivers, parks and trails all over the place and we should be
encouraged to get out and use them," she said. "But before we send too
many people to the provincial parks we need to make sure that they can
handle that sort of load."
There's a $9 fee, charged per vehicle, to enter Parlee Beach, and a $7
fee per vehicle to enter Murray Beach, Mactaquac Provincial Park --
located near Fredericton -- and New River Beach Provincial Park --
located near Saint John.
Alison Aiton, spokeswoman for the Department of Tourism, said the fee
is charged at parks that include swimming beaches. However, a number of
other parks in the province also include beaches but don't require
visitors to pay an entrance fee.
The fee also goes towards covering the cost of lifeguards, although Murray Beach and New River Beach are unsupervised.
The fee also helps with the general upkeep of the beaches and eases
some of the burden of the cost of the parks from taxpayers, said Aiton.
"That's partly for user-pay to recover some of the cost of running
those beaches," she said. "For example, lifeguards at Parlee and
Mactaquac, cleaning the beach, things like that."
The fee isn't significant enough to cover the expenses of the parks,
she said. For example, the province collects about $250,000 in entrance
fees from Parlee Beach.
Other beaches don't require an entrance fee because the province
wouldn't collect enough money to make purchasing the toll booth
worthwhile, Aiton added.
"Logistically we would have to erect another booth to collect that
money and not enough people go there to specifically use that beach
that it would be cost-effective to do that," she said.
"We really do it at some of the more popular beaches where it would be somewhat of a cost-recovery."
As well, anyone can walk into the park for free, she said, and leave their cars outside of the gates.
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