Greater Minnesota Regional Parks and Trails Commission
  • Home
    • Accessibility
  • Applications
    • Application Toolbox
    • Sample Master Plans
  • About
    • Commission Members
    • Commission Login
  • Meetings
  • Regional System
    • Legacy: Clean Water, Land, And Legacy
  • Our Work
    • Strategic Direction
    • Reports and Research
    • MNPAiR
  • Contact Us
  • News

News and Resource Library

Minnesota Parks and Trails Use Report Website

9/1/2023

Comments

 
Picture
Understanding visitation to Minnesota’s parks and trails is essential for planning, programming, and investment decisions. Visitation estimates generally rely on methods such as intercept surveys, in-field visitation counts, and automated trail counters. Visitation estimates using passively-generated data sources may offer opportunities to complement existing strategies.
This project used aggregated and anonymized location-based services (LBS) data to estimate and evaluate visitation to Minnesota parks and trails. LBS data gives information about when and where people travel. This approach provides unprecedented detail about how visitors use parks and trails and broadly describes who those visitors are. Visitation and use patterns can be analyzed at annual, monthly, weekly, and hourly time intervals. This data makes it possible to understand how people travel to parks and trails and where they are coming from. This data is intended to supplement, but not replace existing data used for decision making.

In addition to the full report published previously, this project has been enhanced by an interactive webpage.  The webpage simplifies the reading of the report by breaking it into sections for an overview, parks, trails, frequently asked questions, etc.  Each section also includes interactive pieces to all the viewer to look at results for individual parks and trails or to view the information for just the MN Department of Natural Resources parks and trails, the Greater Minnesota Regional Parks and Trails, and the Twin Cities Metro parks and trails.

This project was created by a collaboration of the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources, the Greater Minnesota Regional Parks and Trails Commission, and ten metropolitan regional park implementing agencies.  This project used funds from the State of Minnesota Parks and Trail Legacy Fund.

Minnesota Parks and Trails Usage Report Website

Picture
Comments

    Categories

    All
    Agency Plans And Reports
    Demographics
    Emerging Trends & Designs
    Natural Resource Management
    News
    Outdoor Recreation Research
    Public Health Values
    Technical Planning & Design Guidelines/Standards


    Archives

    April 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    June 2024
    December 2023
    September 2023
    May 2023
    March 2023
    December 2022
    November 2022
    October 2022
    June 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    October 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    January 2021
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    August 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016


    Subscribe to
    receive blog posts
    in your email.

    Click Here to Subscribe
Picture
Questions? Contact [email protected]
© 2023 Greater Minnesota Regional Parks and Trails Commission.
All Rights Reserved.
News Blog
  • Home
    • Accessibility
  • Applications
    • Application Toolbox
    • Sample Master Plans
  • About
    • Commission Members
    • Commission Login
  • Meetings
  • Regional System
    • Legacy: Clean Water, Land, And Legacy
  • Our Work
    • Strategic Direction
    • Reports and Research
    • MNPAiR
  • Contact Us
  • News