Project Description
The beautiful, rugged landscape of the Sierra Nevada region along the California-Nevada border has supported a plethora of human communities—from Native Americans and early mountain pioneer communities to gold miners, farmers and ski resort entrepreneurs—and has fostered a fantastic environment for nature lovers, explorers, and businessmen to come together to create a vibrant tourism destination. However, popularity of the many iconic locations in the Sierra Nevada region threatens those assets when tourism visitation is highly concentrated. Highly concentrated tourism results in detrimental environmental impacts, degrades visitor experience and does not lend economic support to less visible surrounding locations. Linking conservation practices with local business interests helps preserve the region’s cherished cultural and environmental heritage while contributing to economic growth.
The Sierra Nevada Business Council promotes geotourism development and contributed to the region’s competitiveness as a tourism destination by facilitating collaboration among business owners, local governments, interest groups, and residents, while also marketing the region’s sustainable tourism assets. Solimar supported the implementation of key Sierra Nevada Geotourism initiatives, including the establishment of the Geotourism Stewardship Council and the development of marketing tools and strategies that advanced the promotion of this unique region to global audiences. A National Geographic MapGuide was developed to attract responsible and informed travelers interested in exploring the Sierra Nevada region.
The MapGuide solution not only helped create a more positive and distinctive image of the region, but also facilitated effective cooperation among stakeholders in promoting the area as an integrated tourism destination. In addition, by highlighting authentic local attractions and service providers, the MapGuide increased market visibility for smaller local businesses, contributing to the socioeconomic benefits generated by tourism.
Major Activities
- Facilitated relationship building and cooperation: establishment of the Sierra Nevada Geotourism Stewardship Council to oversee and implement geotourism activities in the region.
- Developed Geotourism MapGuide: members of the Council initiated a process of nominating attractions and tourism service providers, which adhered to geotourism principles. Initial nominations were reviewed and included in the MapGuide while Council members and local stakeholders continue to generate nominations and add to the content of the interactive platform. The Mapguide project has facilitated cooperation among stakeholders in the region, which continues to operate beyond the life of the project.
- Developed online travel tools: continue enriching the Sierra Nevada Geotourism MapGuide with an interactive website that includes trip planning tools and information on the region’s authentic culture, history, and environment.
Results
- Establishment of the Sierra Nevada Wide Geocouncil
- Three paper MapGuides developed
- Project launch in the Yosemite by-way region in August 2009
- Nine local newspapers and three local television stations covered launch events
- 23 geotourism forums held in the region
- 1,400 site nominations received
- 722 local content contributors providing 823 active content website entries
