Parked in the Park: pandemic traffic congestion in Acadia National Park Based on Regression Analysis

Abstract

Contemporarily, the COVID-19 has strongly affected plenty of fields including travel industry. This paper takes Acadia National Park in the United States as a reference to investigate the impact of the epidemic on the number of visitors to the park as well as analyze the impact of the change in visitor numbers on businesses in and around the park. To be specific, the data from the national park's official website and hotels near the park on AirDNA will be used to determine the impact on the park and the surrounding economy based on statistical methods and regression equations. According to the results, the number of visitors to Acadia National Park has skyrocketed due to the epidemic, which led to an increase in demand for nearby hotels and hired staff. The increase in visitors also had a negative impact on the sustainability of Acadia National Park, visitor experience, and flora and fauna habitat. To address the issue, the corresponding solutions to are proposed. These results shed light on guiding further explorations for outdoor tourism areas in the post-epidemic era.