Skiing heavily relies on specific weather and environmental conditions to make participation both feasible and enjoyable. The lack of published research on the relationships among ski activity, weather, and climate is, therefore, surprising, especially in light of mounting evidence regarding climate change. The analyses of the influence of daily weather variations on daily ski lift ticket sales at two Michigan ski resorts presented here appear to be the first of their kind. Results suggest that weather variables such as minimum and maximum temperature, snow depth, and wind chill do indeed have a statistically significant impact on downhill ski lift ticket sales. The regression models developed could be used by outdoor recreation and tourism providers for both short-term decision making and longer-term planning and management activities, in particular those involving consideration of climate change and potential adaptation strategies.

No abstract

Despite the obvious influence of weather conditions on golfing activity, the relationships between participation in golf and specific weather variations have rarely been considered in the empirical literature. Given the increasing evidence to support global climate change, quantification of historical relationships between participation and weather conditions is a vital prerequisite to modeling the potential implications of changing weather patterns for participation in outdoor activities such as golf. The purpose of this article was to determine the influence of weather variations on daily golfing activity at three golf courses in Michigan. Multiple regression analysis revealed that variations in maximum temperature and precipitation had statistically significant influences on daily golfing activity in all the models developed. Fluctuations in other variables, including minimum temperature, public holidays, consumer confidence, and the price of gas, also emerged as significant, but not consistently so across all the models. The results presented highlight both the problems and opportunities associated with modeling the relationships between outdoor activity participation and weather conditions. While the models constructed do identify interesting relationships between the variables tested, they also illuminate the difficulties in accounting for the myriad of influences on outdoor activity participation in a quantitative setting. Nevertheless, the analyses should be of immense utility to outdoor recreation and tourism planners and managers for both the short-and long-term planning and management of their enterprises. Models of present-day relationships between activity participation and variability in climatic, economic, and other relevant factors could aid in short-term decisions regarding issues such as purchasing and staffing requirements. When combined with scenarios of future climatic, economic, and other conditions, they could also be used to inform choices regarding the expansion of existing facilities and diversification into new geographic and/or activity domains.

No abstract

Since destination image is accepted as an important element of destination management, destination management organizations (DMOs) commonly engage in destination image studies. The majority of published image studies have focused on measuring the image of a particular destination at a point in time. Destination image is prone to change but this aspect received little attention due to lack of studies measuring image change over time. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to assess the change in the image of a destination over a period of time using the same instrument on the same sampling destinations. A large scale and longitudinal market survey data gathered by the Michigan Regional Travel Market Survey were analyzed for the purposes of this study. The findings indicated that Michigan had an image change between 1996 and 2002 since the image of the most image dimensions recorded significant improvement in these markets. Potential reasons, managerial implications as well as limitations and future research suggestions are provided.