Recreation Benefits and Displaced Facilities

ABSTRACT

A new recreation site or improvement of an existing site results in an increase in demand for that site perhaps at the expense of substitute facilities. A brief literature review indicates differing views on how benefits from displaced facilities should be treated. I demonstrate that benefits of a new recreation facility can be measured as the change in consumers' surplus at the affected site and that benefits forgone at substitute sites can be ignored. However, if a change in demand for one site causes other prices to change, the net change in benefits is the sum of the increment in consumer's surplus in each affected market.

KEYWORDS:

• Recreation benefits
• displaced facilities