THE VALUE OF A RECREATIONAL BEACH VISIT: AN APPLICATION TO MOOLOOLABA BEACH AND COMPARISONS WITH OTHER OUTDOOR RECREATION SITES

Beaches and foreshores worldwide offer a broad range of goods and services to coastal communities and economies. One service, beach recreation, provides considerable benefits to most Australians. This paper represents the first Australian attempt to value a recreational visit to surf beaches within the local urban setting of Mooloolaba beach, Sunshine Coast, Queensland using a truncated negative binomial individual travel cost model. Income, on-site and off-site travel expenditure and time, party size, and employment status helped to explain visits. The consumer surplus estimates provided in this paper are within the bounds of the international literature. The passive-use values of beaches are higher than those of national parks or forests. Assessing beach non-use values is an area for future research.