Advantages and Limitations of Using Mobile Apps for Protected Area Monitoring and Management

Abstract

Digital technologies, including participatory Internet mapping, social media and smartphones, provide new avenues for research in outdoor recreation and tourism. The potential to reach a greater audience and collect visitation data on a broader scale, with less costs than traditional paper surveys, are key advantages that have increased the use of these novel technologies. Using of mobile apps for data collection is still at the experimental stage. We evaluate previous attempts to use apps for monitoring recreation and tourism in protected areas, as an alternative to other in situ or online methods. We present a pilot study implemented in Jotunheimen National Park (Norway), where we developed a mobile app for visitor monitoring and real-time mapping of values and experiences. We present the lessons learned, give suggestions on how and for what apps can be used, and discuss the advantages and limitations of using smartphones for visitor monitoring in protected areas.

Keywords:

• Ecosystem services
• geotag
• mobile application
• recreation
• spatial
• value mapping
• visitors to protected area

Acknowledgments

The authors thank F.J. Ancin-Murguzur for constructive comments on the design of the survey and manuscript. Further, we want to thank N. Backman from Designråd for developing “Jotunheimen Tracking” mobile app.

Additional information

Funding

This study was funded by UiT – The Arctic University of Norway under the PhD project “Nature based tourism in protected areas: tradeoffs and synergies among cultural ecosystem services”.