State Park Attendance

As with New Jersey, park attendance has been on the rise recently in Rhode Island. A slight drop-off in the mid-90's has rebounded into a steady increase in the last three years of the decade. Up by almost 30% since 1998 in per capita use (Up 50% according to the actual visitation numbers) we can see that Rhode Islanders are getting out more and exploring the many state parks available to them. For a listing of the RI State Parks, and information on beaches, click here.

State Park attendance figures are based on an estimation performed by the Recreation and Parks Department. Many of the day and night sites require permits that can be purchased day of or as a pass. Passes are scanned using a bar code system, and each car is estimated to have 3.2 people on the average.

So what does an increase in park attendance mean for Rhode Island? Compare these figures with the land acquisition data and you will see that while the need for park space is increasing, we have stopped putting money into expanding our State Park system. It is also evident by looking at our per capita acreage, that we do not have very much land compared with our neighbors. We do see, however, very high visitation per capita compared with New Jersey and Deleware. This is due to the small size and dense population of our state, and the incredible amount of tourism that our beaches draw in the summer.

The greenways plan aims to help solve some of these issues by creating a network of open space in Rhode Island that will be based on recreation trails. The trends we see here lend us to consider this program necessary to provide Rhode Islanders with ample recreation opportunities in the future.

For separate statistics on actual visitation numbers, overnight and day use click here