Rural recreation space: alternatives to national parks
Increasing pressure on public resource-based recreation areas, coupled with budgetary constraints and a scarcity of suitable land, have led some countries to consider alternative means of providing rural recreation space convenient for urban populations. In Australia, opportunities exist to create national reserves thereby encouraging rural landholders to permit use of selected sites for recreation purposes as a complement to national parks. Despite some limitations and disadvantages the national reserve concept has had wide application in the United States, Britain and Europe. Given understanding, consultation and co-operation, similar reserves, or ‘countryside parks’ modelled on the national reserve concept, could serve as an efficient, cost-effective means of making available extra-urban recreation space in Australia.