Coastal Management Fall 2017

2017 Coastal Opinions
Specific Locations-The Beach

By Raul Perez, Michael Inocente, and Jamie Masukawa

Ormond Beach, California

INTRODUCTION

Costal areas are home to a large and growing proportion of the world’s population and are undergoing increasing environmental destruction. There are approximately 3 billion people living within 100 miles of a coastline, and that figure is expected to double by 2025 (Creel 2003). Although a high concentration of people in costal regions produce many economic benefits, the ever-growing inflow of people threaten the ecosystems found within these locations (Creel 2003).

In efforts to better understand the public’s view towards costal resources, we explored sentiments about the California coastal zone. Generally and in particular looked at the effect income has on the way people interact and value coastal beaches. Our group sought to analyze the relationship between the amount of money spent within the coastal zone and the frequency and distance one would travel to the beach. We had also analyzed the correlation between income and a person’s ideal beach. Which we had done through our 2017 CSUCI Public Opinion Poll, where we had sampled those who are living in Santa Barbara, Ventura and Los Angeles counties between late September and late October of 2017.

Overview of current Situation

We hypothesized that there was a correlation between the annual income and the frequency of visitation to the beach. More specifically, we thought that the more affluent a person was, the more frequent they would travel to the beach. This group also looked to see if there was a relationship between the frequency of visits and amount spent per week along the coast. We hypothesized that a more affluent person is likely to spend more money at the beach. We also hypothesized that more affluent people would prefer a more idealized groomed beach rather than a rustic natural beach.

Despite the beach itself to be free or inexpensive, the ancillary expenses and social barriers associated with visitation are what often makes it tough for low-income residents to enjoy the beach (Williams 2017). A study conducted at UCLA further explored these sentiments demonstrating how travel costs and a lack of affordable accommodations prevent low-income families from going to the beach. The study found an average travel cost for a one-day visit to the beach was $22 not including parking or food, and an increase of $15 can deter many low-income families from making the trip altogether (Christensen, King 2017). An overnight stay was shown to be even less affordable having an average four-day stay within a beach town being $605 (Christensen, King 2017). 

Persons in low income households are not only unable to afford the beach, but are unable to access the beach as well. Low income families are unable to attend the beach largely because they are less likely to have a vehicle due to having a greater part of their income spent on food and shelter (Murakami and Young 1997). About 26% of low income households do not own a car, and if they do their car is often older than 10 years (Murakami and Young 1997).People in low income households are often forced to walk to their destinations. So much that they are twice as likely to walk to their destination than any other income class. (Murakami and Young 1997). Often a 3 mile distance limits a lower income citizen to make a “long distance” trip. Where we define a long distance trip to be 50 miles to any single destination. On Average a low income citizen is said to make less than half the number of long distance trips than the rest of the general population with 1.6 trips a year compared to the 3.9 trips a year (Mallett 2000).

Relevant Survey Questions

We felt that five questions adequately assessed the attitudes of people and their relationship to the coastal area:

1. Your household’s annual income?
   1. <$30,000___$30-$60,000___$60-$90,000___$90-$120,000___$120-$150,000___>$150,000
2. Last time you went to the beach, how far did you travel to get there (in miles)?
3. If we define “the coast” as the area within 10 miles of the ocean, how much money do you estimate you spent at the coast in the past 7 days?
4. How often do you visit these areas?
   1. SoCal beaches
      1. Daily___ Weekely___ Monthly ___ Few Times a year___ Once a Year___  > once a year ____
5. My ideal beach would:
   1. Have primary fine, sugary sand vs. have lots of rocks, driftwood, kelp etc.
   2. Have no birds or animals vs. have all kinds of birds, seals, ect.
   3. Groomed/ raked daily vs. have a wild “natural” look to it

RESULTS

We binned respondents into one of three income categories for our analysis. We placed those who have a household income of $60,000 and lower as those who are of low income. Those with a household income ranging from $60,000 to $90,000 as holding an average income. Lasetly we placed all those making more than $90,000 as high income. These brackets follow United States Census in California that showed the real median household income is $73,581 (Semega et. al. 2017).

With our responses divided up into these respective income brackets, we expected to see those who fell under having low income to have a further distance traveled than both the average and high income population, we also expect the low income citizens to spend less within our coastal areas, visit at a reduced rate, and value the environment more for its natural look. While in contrast we expect to see the high income citizens to spend more money within our coasts, visit at a more frequent rate, and value the environment in an ideal and “developed” manner. As for the average demographic we expect to see them swing in between the two other demographics with no defiant preference to either side.

Household Income

With a total of 992 surveyors who disclosed their annual household income, a vast majority of them were considered to fall under the less fortunate social class. Specifically a total of 432 or 43.55% of the population we had surveyed were of low income, coming in a close second with 334 people or 33.67% of the population fell under having a high income. With lastly having 226 people or the minority of 22.78% falling under earning an average income.

Despite our findings not being significantly different from each other, preventing ourselves from determining which economic class has a greater prevalence in the surveyed counties. Our findings are congruent to that of the Pew Research Center who shown that the middle class or the average income class has been shrinking allowing for a larger part of the population to fall into the low or high income class (Desilver 2015).

Travel distance it took to get to the beach on last visit

As expected from our hypothesis low income citizens had the longest distance traveled to the last visited beach compared to any other economic class, however not by much. After factoring out any extreme outliers and performing a query that disregarded any distance traveled over 200 miles we had reached the following final values. The less fortunate demographic had to travel an average of 16.69 miles to their last beach visit, while the average income citizens had to travel 15.62 miles and the high income citizens only had to travel 14.88 miles to their last beach location.

These values after factoring out the extreme outliers as expected are fairly low and relatively close to one another. We expected to see these values close to one another, considering for the most part the surveys in which these answers were given were within costal counties and communities. Often having the beach within a fair distance, for future studies we might consider comparing the response we get from inland communities against those from coastal communities.

Money Spent on the Coast within the Last Week

Our hypothesis further gets supported through the results of the average amount of money each economic class had spent within the coast. As expected those with a high income had significantly spent more of their income within the coastal zones than citizens making both a low and average income.

The values given within this dataset may slightly be overstated as according to a UCLA study an average person spends approximately $250 a week within our southern California costal zone (Christensen, King 2017). When considering our average income citizen’s expenses within the coast they are reported spending over $432 more than an average person would. We as a group concluded that this over estimation can be attributed towards the lack of a clear definition of a coastal zone. For our study we had defined the coast to be within 10 miles of the ocean, however many other members of the public may define the costal zone to be a larger or smaller distance. As an example legally in the sate of California NOAA defines the costal zone to be 1,000 yards inland from the mean high tide line (NOAA 2012).

It is with this confusion that our data shows those citizens who make a high income are spending on average $995.48 within a given week. Whereas in contrast a citizen within an average income is spending $682.09 within a week and the low income citizen is spending $569.72 in a given week.

Beach Visitation Frequency

We found no support for our hypothesis, we had predicted that one’s annual household income would determine a person’s frequency of visitations to the beach. We had expected that high income achieving folk would be more prone to visit our Southern California beaches more often than any others who generate a lower annual household income. Our data showed the complete opposite. In a majority of the cases the lower income achieving citizens visit the beach with greater frequency than both the average income person and the high income person.

If we were to go further and separate and place each response in one of two categories, that being those who visit the beach at least monthly and those at least once the year the low income citizens still trumps all the others based on whole values, however statistically the low income and high income citizens are not significantly different from each other. Instead they both individually visit the beach at the same frequency whether it be on a monthly basis or on a yearly one.

Ideal Beach

We initially found no grossly apparent trend in ideal beach preference. However if group each of the responses further into one of two subcategories of those preferring a natural beach or preferring a more managed beach we can see a distinct difference between the different economic classes.

Human-altered coats vary greatly in appearance, landscapes can have significant human impact on them but be barely perceptible or they can be severely noticed with dominate landscape changes (Nordstorm 2000). For our purposes we had defined a “natural” beach to be one free of construction or any type of infrastructure, populated with organisms that are native and abundant to an area, as well as free from any alterations to the landscape such as foreign sand or removal of natural debris.

Negril beach is a natural beach, filled with natural trees and debris.

Pandawa Beach is a developed beach with installed seating areas.

Regardless of economic class the general public values our Southern California Beaches for their “natural” look and not for their managed looks. One’s annual household income had no significant influence in determining how they value the environment. In all three cases an overwhelming amount of the total responses over 60% or more than half of the general public value the beaches for their natural look.

INTERPRETATION

With 1,491 people partaking in the public opinion poll, 44% of our participants fell under the low income economic class, 33% had a high income, and 23% fell under an average income. The general attitude of the public were in favor of a natural costal zone rather than a developed groomed costal zone. The public regardless of their economic class specifically favored a beach that was undeveloped and unaltered. The public however began to deviate from one another when we considered the average distance a specific economic class took to travel to the beach as well as the average amount of money spent within the coastal zone. The low income citizen on average had a larger distance traveled to the beach as well as a low amount of money spent within the coast when compared to the high income citizen who had the reverse outcomes. The low income achieving citizens did however attend the beach at a more frequent rate than both the high and average income citizens.

Key Takeaway

The California coasts and beaches are among our state’s most important democratic spaces. Despite our differences, we all share the same desires that draws us to the beach  (Christensen, King 2017). Thankfully a person’s income does not diminish nor tarnish ones appreciation for that natural landscape. Although income does not alter a persons perception of our costal area, income does help to alleviate some of the troubles associated with accessing the beach. As well as help promote the enjoyment our costal zones.

REFERENCES

Creel, Liz. 2003. Ripple Effects: Population and Coastal Regions. Population Reference Bureau. http://www.prb.org/Publications/Reports/2003/RippleEffectsPopulationandCoastalRegions.aspx

Christensen, John. King, Philip. 20017. Access For All: A New Generation’s Challenges on the California Coast. UCLA loES. https://www.ioes.ucla.edu/project/coastal-access-california/

Williams, Lauren. 2017. Some People Can’t Afford to go to the Beach, and Lawmakers Want to Change That. Orange County Register. http://www.ocregister.com/2017/02/06/some-people-cant-afford-to-go-to-the-beach-and-lawmakers-want-to-change-that/

Murakami, Elaine. Young, Jennifer. 1997. Daily Travel by Persons with Low Income. NPTS Symposium. http://nhts.ornl.gov/1995/Doc/LowInc.pdf

Mallett, William J. 2000. Long Distance Travel by Low-Income Households. Bureau of Transportation Statistics. U.S. Department of Transportation.  http://onlinepubs.trb.org/onlinepubs/circulars/ec026/04_mallet.pdf

CSU Channel Islands. 2017. California State University Channel Islands Survey of Public Opinion of Coastal Resources.

Semega, Jessica L. Fontenoe, Kayla R. Kollar, Melissa A. 2016. Income and Poverty in the United States: 2017. United States Census Bureau Report Number P60-259. https://www.census.gov/library/publications/2017/demo/p60-259.html

Desilver, Drew. 2015. America’s middle class is shrinking. So who’s leaving it? Pew Research Center. Fact Tank. http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/12/14/americas-middle-class-is-shrinking-so-whos-leaving-it/

NOAA. 2012. State Coastal Zone Boundaries. Definition of State’s Costal Zone. https://coast.noaa.gov/czm/media/StateCZBoundaries.pdf

Nordstorm, Karl F. 2000. Beaches and Dunes of Developed Coasts. Cambridge University Press. http://catdir.loc.gov/catdir/samples/cam032/99013766.pdf

Garcia, Robert, Erica Flores Baltodano. 2005. The City Project. Free the Beach! Public Access, Equal Justice, and the California Coast. 2 Stanford Journal of Civil Rights and Civil Liberties 143. https://www.cityprojectca.org/ourwork/documents/StanfordFreetheBeach.pd