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National Heritage Areas:

Identifying and Measuring Success

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


What is a heritage area?

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


Why do it?
• Working at a landscape scale

• Meeting needs of nature &


culture

• Revitalizing community and


identity

• Managing change

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


Heritage Areas in the United States

• 24 National Heritage Areas


• Designated between 1984-2003
• Primarily in the East
• 18 states
• 46.5 million people
• 20% of National
Historic Landmarks

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


Other initiatives
• State programs
• Grassroots initiatives
• Collaborative conservation

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


National Heritage Areas in an
international context
• Working in partnership with communities
• IUCN Category V Protected Landscapes/ Seascapes
• National Parks as living landscapes
• Learning from international exchange

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


The Evolving role of NPS
Challenges to developing a program
• The model of “great western parks”

• Battlefields, parkways, seashores, trails

• Partnership parks

• National Heritage Areas

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


The Evolving role of NPS
Illinois and Michigan Canal

• Designated in 1984

• 97-mile canal corridor

• 1067 units of local government

• State and local involvement

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


The Evolving role of NPS
Cane River National Heritage Area
• Designated in 1994

• Twinned with Cane River Creole National


Historical Park

• Park owns 62 of 45,000 acres

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


The Evolving role of NPS
Challenges
• Public demand

• Congressional interest

• Sixteen new area proposals

• Eight study proposals

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


The Evolving role of NPS
Criteria for evaluation
• National importance

• Place-based
resources

• Public involvement

• Community capacity

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


The Evolving role of NPS
Remaining questions
• Role of National Park Service

• Benefits of standardization

• Fiscal investment and outcomes

• Need to measure success

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


Data Collection strategy

• What is success?

• Pressure to develop metrics

• Program accountability

• Direct, indirect, and informative impacts

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


4 categories of data collection
1. Physical, social, economic characteristics

2. Overlapping designations, programs, resources

3. Heritage area-sponsored initiatives

4. Aggregate economic leveraging impact

5. Regional economic impacts of heritage tourism

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


1. Physical, social, economic characteristics

• Demographics

• Economics

• Inventory of historic & natural


resources

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


2. Overlapping designations, programs,
resources
• Public lands

• American Heritage
Rivers

• Scenic byways

• Rural development
districts

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


3. Heritage area-sponsored initiatives

• Education • Resource conservation

• Volunteering • Partnerships and projects

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


4. Economic leveraging impact

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


5. Regional Economics of heritage tourism

• MGM2 Model

• Findings

• Impacts

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


Hypothesis of change

• Common characteristics:
– Working landscapes in transition

– Older and changing populations

– Stable core resident population


• Natural features and economics are
linked
• Similar cultural landscapes require
similar approaches to managing
change

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


What next? Impacts
• Justifying value of designation

• Defining national interest

• Shaping program legislation and policy

• Developing a list of social and value-based questions

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


What next? Parallel efforts
• Sharing a research
agenda

• Encouraging graduate
level research

• Partnership with related


federal programs

• GIS

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


What next? Future steps
• Methods to accurately measure confluence of
quality of life and multiple definitions of “success”
– existing national/ international models

– new model with qualitative aspects

• Stronger correlation between designation and


improvement of community and economic values

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


What next? At a crossroads

• Proposed national legislation


• Collaborative conservation
• Landscape level programs

National Park Service | National Heritage Areas


Questions?
202.354.2222
www.cr.nps.gov/heritageareas/

National Park Service


National Heritage Areas

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