Proximity of Trails in the Annapolis County

to Infrastructure and Points of Interest

By: Hayleigh ConwayMajor Research Project in GIS for

Business

• Related Past Projects• Problem Presentation• Goals and Objectives• Literature Review• Data Preparation• Data Processing• Geographical Analysis• ROI (Return on Investment)• Limitations• Conclusions• Ideas for the Future

Presentation Outline

Related Past Projects

• Geographic Analysis of Backcountry Hiking Routes and Habits by James McKeown (Parks Canada, 2010)

• Analyzing the Patterns of Visitor Use at Seaside Adjunct, Kejimkujik National Park by Voytek Lapczynski (Parks Canada, 2007)

• An Analysis of the Relationships Between Price and Proximity to Amenities for Residential Real Estate Within the Halifax Regional Municipality by Bill Livingstone (Turner, Drake and Partners, 2007)

Problem Presentation

• Tourism in Nova Scotia creates 2 billion dollars of revenue each year

• In particular, the Fundy Shore and Annapolis Valley generated $293 million dollars in 2010

• Possible way to increase this revenue: deliver more information about shared-use trails and their amenities to trail users

• This involves making a comprehensive dataset with Infrastructure and Points of Interest information, and determining their proximity to trails

• Study area was Annapolis County: 3380 km2 with various shared-use trails spread throughout

• Activity types chosen to be considered: Walking, Hiking, Biking, ATV-ing, and Snowmobiling

Goals and Objectives

• Discover the opinions of trail users on various aspects of trail use

• Analyze the relationship between Infrastructure, Points of Interest, landcover and trails

• Begin a database of natural phenomena and businesses in the Annapolis County

Literature Review

Not many studies in the same vein, but several which had interesting ideas about shared trail use• Predicting Motivations and Attitudes of Users

of a Multi-Use Suburban Trail (Lee, Scott, Moore, 2002)– 87% of adults in the United States used a shared-

use trail during 1999 – 2000– Very useful ‘Motivations of APT Users’ survey, which

was in part used during the project

Literature Review

(Lee, J., Scott, D., Moore, R, 2002)

Literature Review

• Built Environment and Psychosocial Factors Associated with Trail Proximity and Use (Abildso, Zizzi, 2007)

• “individuals’ physical activity choices are influenced by the physical and sociocultural environments in which they live in and interact.”– Trail use is strongly correlated with the physical

environment surrounding the trail

Collecting Data

• Manually collected Infrastructure (a permanent point which provides goods or services to an individual)…

• and Points of Interest (a business, attraction or natural phenomena which a person can visit) points throughout Annapolis County from a variety of different sources

Some Sources of Infrastructure Collection

• Restaurants in Annapolis Royal: http://www.annapolisroyal.com/visitor-restaurants)

• Nova Scotia Parks (http://www.novascotiaparks.ca/misc/fundyshore.asp)

• Nova Scotia Museums (https://museum.novascotia.ca) • Wines of Nova Scotia (http://

winesofnovascotia.ca/wineries)• Nova Scotia Bed and Breakfast Association (

http://www.nsbedandbreakfast.com/) • Nova Scotia Boat Ramp Locations (http://

www.boatlaunches.ca/map-of-nova-scotia-boat-ramps)

Completed Infrastructure Collection ResultsInfrastructure Type Count

Restaurant 49Bed and Breakfast 18

Campground 15Hotel 14Cabin 12

Gas Station 11Park 10

Library 9Boat Launch 7

Baseball Field 3Grocery Store 3

Hospital 3Visitor Information 3

Community Hall 2Fire Hall 2

Hall 2Parking Area 2

Hostel 1Marina 1

Spa 1

168 total points

Data Preparation

Some Sources of Point of Interest Collection

• The Nova Scotia Lighthouse Preservation Society (http://www.nslps.com/)

• Waterfalls of Nova Scotia (http://nswaterfalls.blogspot.ca/)

• Valley Family Fun (http://www.valleyfamilyfun.ca/)• Valley Tourism (http://www.valleytourism.ca/) • Our Valley (http://ourvalley.ca/attractions/) • Nova Scotia’s Backyard http://

www.novascotiabackyard.com/explore-our-regions/bay-of-fundy-and-annapolis-valley)

Completed Point of Interest Collection Results

Point of Interest CountHistoric Site 22Waterfall 16Museum 15Specialty Store 7Lighthouse 7Festival 6Pool 6Farmer’s Market 5Golf Course 5Playground 5Heritage Panel 4Look off 4Tennis Courts 4Beach 3Arena 2Bowling Alley 2Cave 2Curling Rink 2Fitness Centre 2Society 2Softball Field 2Theatre 2Vineyard 2Amusement Park 1Bridge 1Canoe Rental 1Field 1Fishing 1Gallery 1Garden 1Go-Carting 1Guided Walk 1Harbour 1Lawn Bowling 1Mini Golf 1Soccer Field 1Tidal Power 1

141 total points

Data Preparation

Other Data SourcesRoads and Trails:• GeoBase (www.geobase.ca)– Used Resource/Recreation, Arterial, Collector and

Local/Street road classes– 27 Shared-Use Trails

• Snowmobilers Association of Nova Scotia (www.snowmobilersns.com)

Forests, Lakes and Streams:• AGRG SDE Database

Data Preparation

Data ProcessingNow that to do with all these points and trails?

• Built a weighting scheme based on the importance of each type of point

• Who knows what they need while using a trail better than trail users themselves?

• Infrastructure weights determined differently than Point of Interest weights

‘Infrastructure Importance and Motivations of Trail Users’ Survey

• 10 questions, 214 respondents• Distributed to several trail user groups throughout

the province:– The Snowmobilers Association of Nova Scotia– Run Nova Scotia (http://www.runnovascotia.ca )– Hike Nova Scotia (http://www.hikenovascotia.ca)– Bicycle Nova Scotia (http://www.bicycle.ns.ca/) – The Nova Scotia Ramblers Bicycle Club (

http://nsramblers.ca/ )– COGS students and faculty– Social media

Activity Type Results

Infrastructure Importance Results

Motivations Results

Weighted Infrastructure Values

Infrastructure Type Weight

Restaurant 17

Parking Area 16

Gas Station 15

Grocery Store 10

Cabin 6

Bed and Breakfast 5

Campground 5

Visitor Information 5

Hotel 4

Park 4

Fire Hall 2

Hospital 2

Hostel 2

Baseball Field 1

Boat Launch 1

Community Hall 1

Hall 1

Library 1

Marina 1

Spa 1

The Delphi Method

• “an interactive forecasting method which relies on a panel of experts to help assign weights to specific criteria” (Dalkey and Helmer, 1963)

The Delphi Method

Delphi Method

Delphi Method

Delphi Method

Delphi Method

Delphi Method

Delphi Method

Delphi Method

Delphi Method

Delphi Method Results

Weighted Point of Interest ValuesPoint of Interest WeightLook off 29Waterfall 14Lighthouse 7Historic Site 6Farmer’s Market 5Festival 4Museum 3Specialty Store 3Amusement Park 1Arena 1Beach 1Bowling Alley 1Bridge 1Canoe Rental 1Cave 1Curling Rink 1Field 1Fishing 1Fitness Centre 1Gallery 1Garden 1Go-Carting 1Golf Course 1Guided Walk 1Harbour 1Heritage Panel 1Lawn Bowling 1Mini Golf 1Playground 1Pool 1Soccer Field 1Society 1Softball Field 1Tennis Courts 1Theatre 1Tidal Power 1Vineyard 1

Next Steps

• Tackled majority of analysis treating Infrastructure and Point of Interest as two separate entities

• Combined them towards the end• Considered 3 major variables: Distance to

Infrastructure, Distance to Points of Interest and Distance to Landcover

Network Analyst

• Used Network Analyst extension to create routes to the closest facility for both Infrastructure and POI separately

• Surface creation of Distance and Time to closest facility for each activity type: Walking, Hiking, Biking, ATV-ing and Snowmobiling

• Speed varied for each activity type

Geographical Analysis

Geographical Analysis

Trail Ranking

• Trail ranks were determined by the length of each trail, or road segment

• Used the route results from Network Analyst• Used natural breaks to divide the trails into 10

categories• Shorter trails received a higher rank (closer to

points) • Longer trails received a lower rank (farther

away from points)

Geographical Analysis

Point Ranking

• Weights of Infrastructure and Points of Interest were converted into ranks (making them out of 10), and these ranks were added to trail ranks

• Result: Ranking of trails based on their distance to either Infrastructure or Points of Interest

What about Landcover on Trails?

Landcover Ranking

• Forest, Lakes and Streams given a rank out of 10 based on survey results

• Forest = 5, Lakes = 3, Streams = 2• Found which trails intersected with each

landcover type, and gave those trails a rank• Same method as ranking trails based on

distance from points• Result: Ranking of Trails based on their distance

to Landcover

Final Trail Suitability

• Final suitability was determined by simply adding the 2 suitability's together: Distance to Points and Distance to Landcover

• Suitability now out of 20

Final Result

• Wanted to know route proximity to both Infrastructure and POI at the same time

• Challenge to intersect the two datasets• Ended up performing a spatial join• Result: Ranking of trails out of 20 based on

their proximity to Infrastructure, Points of Interest and Landcover

Geographical Analysis

Attractiveness of Trails

Attractiveness Category Number of Roads Total Length (km)

16 – 20 277 0.69512 – 16 491 1.5188 – 12 959 5.1904 – 8 2010 16.2450 - 4 984 20.098

Return on Investment

• “success or failure of a project or program of work…[a]nd uses a combination of quantitative and qualitative measures to assess the utility that an organization will obtain from an investment” (Maguire et al., 2008)

• Huge potential to increase tourism in the Annapolis Valley – the second highest grossing region in the province

Revenue Potential

• In 2010, restaurants and transportation generated the most revenue by sector type

• Restaurants: most chosen point of Infrastructure in survey

• Sharing and using the data collected: cost for implementing it, but could have vast rewards as users would be better able to determine which trails they should go on

Limitations

• Bias in determining weights• Could not include trail length, road name,

elevation, or proximity to towns in analysis• Actual trails data• Forest polygons of the entire County made

actual ranking difficult• Entirely possible that points were missed

during data collection

Conclusions

• Restaurants and look-offs: most sought after points

• Spas and vineyards – least sought after points• Survey was successful, but could have included

other questions• Less than 1 kilometer of the “best” trails – not

one road but instead segments of various roads• 20 kilometers of the “worst” trails

Ideas for the Future

• Spend more time on the survey (creation and analyzing of results)

• Create a tool where a trail users can select the Infrastructure and POI they’re looking for, determines where they should go

• Include more information about the actual trail: - Conditions

- Elevation- Length- Name

References• Abildso, C., Zizzi, S., et al. (2007). Built Environment and

Psychosocial Factors Associated with Trail Proximity and Use. American Journal of Health Behavior. 31(4): 374-383.

• Dalkey, N., and Helmer, O. (1963). An Experimental Application of the Delphi Method to the Use of Experts. Management Science 9(3): 458-467.

• Lee, J., Scott, D., Moore, R. (2002). Predicting Motivations and Attitudes of Users of a Multi-use suburban trail. Journal of Park and Recreation Administration. 20(3): 18-37.

• Maguire, D., Kouyoumjian, V., Smith, R. (2008). The Business Benefits of GIS: An ROI Approach. Esri Press pg. 3 – 4.

Many Thanks to…

• Konrad and Ela Dramowicz• My COGS AGIS Team• Participants in my survey

Thank you!

Questions?