(Georgia Institute of Technology, 2022-05-03)
Bray, Vincent Micah
Recreational trails are a crucial component of public infrastructure in communities across the United States, having significant social, environmental, and economic impacts in urban, suburban, and rural settings. In addition to benefits derived from recreation, trails also play an important role for commuters seeking alternative modes to motorized vehicles. Furthermore, recreational trails have provided communities with outdoor space to foster resiliency in the face of lockdowns and quarantines during the COVID-19 pandemic. Despite growing national importance, deficits in funding for operations and maintenance (O&M) have led to deferred maintenance backlogs that reduce the value added by recreational trails while worsening negative environmental impacts. This work proposes a value capture (VC) approach to funding trail O&M that dedicates state sales tax revenue generated from retail trade and food and accommodation services supported by recreational trails to trust funds that can be distributed to state and local trail managing entities. State-level estimates are generated using economic data from the Outdoor Recreation Satellite Account of the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis to estimate sales tax revenue from activities and industries supported by trails. VC estimates are further analyzed to assess the scale and stability of this funding approach before identifying methods for implementation of this approach. Findings of this study include: 1) total estimated state sales tax revenue of $10.64 billion in 2020 USD suggests that VC could greatly expand O&M funding for trails at the state level; 2) not all states may see growth in economic activity supported by recreational trails as demographic shifts occur between states; and 3) successful implementation of VC would likely require legislative protections to prevent reduction of appropriations or diversion of funds to other state accounts.