Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
ENVIRONMENTAL PERSPECTIVES ON COASTAL
RECREATION AND TOURISM
The environment for coastal leisure pursuits has seen the geographer make a number of
influential contributions from a range of perspectives. In the early analysis of the
coastline for tourism and recreation, Cosgrove and Jackson (1972) identified the vital
characteristic which makes the coast a major focal point for geographical analysis: it is a
zonal resource, with activities concentrated at specific places, making management a key
issue in time and space. Although the coast may have a number of different resource
designations (e.g. Heritage Coastline and Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty in England
and Wales), the impacts of tourism and recreation are multifaceted. In the wide-ranging
study by the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (1997), the dominant
coastline regions globally were the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico,
the Indian Ocean islands, Australasia and the Pacific islands. In this context, the coastal
resource is a global environmental issue which is complex, diverse and not simply
reduced to beach resorts, as the discussion has alluded so far. (See Visser and Njunga's
(1992) examination of the Kenyan coastline where the ecological diversity in the coastal
environment comprises coral reefs, sea grass and seaweed beds, mangrove forests, sand-
dunes and inland tropical forests.)
According to the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation (1997), coastal
tourism environments may be categorised as follows:
• oceanic islands
• coral reefs
• offshore waters
• mangroves
• near-coastal wetlands
• sandy beaches
• coastal dunes.
In terms of the environments under the greatest recreational and tourism pressure are
sandy beaches followed by coastal dunes (see Nordstom et al. 2000 for a review of
management practices to restore dunes). Within a European context, the principal erosion
and sedimentation processes affecting coastal environments are related to natural
processes including
• wave and tidal action
• geomorphological factors (e.g. rivers which impact upon the river mouth and deltas)
• meteorological factors (e.g. wind and storms)
• changes in sea-level
• geological processes (e.g. seismic and volcanic activity).
In addition, the European coastline is also subjected to a great number of environmental
stresses, to the point where some researchers consider it to be under the greatest pressure
of any coastal environment globally (German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation
