This research focuses on the measurement of monetary benefits and costs associated with tourism in metropolitan areas. Most studies on the impact of tourism have been at the national or state level and are not directly appropriate to more limited geographic units. The planning agencies and Chambers of Commerce that are normally involved in promoting tourism work with the metropolitan area, a jurisdiction which is different from that on which most previous studies have been done. In this study, an answer to the following research question is sought: Do public expenditures attributable to tourism outweigh the revenue benefits derived from tourism in a metropolitan area, or is the taxpayer subsidizing the tourism industry? The Portland metropolitan area was selected as a case on which to develop a methodology for ascertaining the economic impact of tourism. Since the tourism industry is extensively fragmented, data were collected from several sources to measure its impact. Using these data, a methodology for weighing monetary costs against benefits attributable to tourism was developed. Three methodological sequences were carried out in the study. The first two were models to compute income and employment multiplier effects. These models helped in the development of intermediate inputs applied in executing the last methodological sequence--the monetary benefit-cost model. The analytical findings strongly support the following two hypotheses: (1) Tourism provides significant employment creation and income generation possibilities. (2) Tourism creates more benefits than it causes service costs to the metropolitan area. For example, it was found that the income and employment multiplier effects from tourists' spendings in the area were 1.1024 during the study period. Also, while the metropolitan area spent $27,873,133.80 in providing services to tourists, it realized $33,516,481.17 in monetary benefits from tourists' spendings. when monetary costs were subtracted from benefits, the metropolitan area realized a net monetary benefit of $5.6 million from tourists' spendings in the area.

This thesis examples some of the factors that appear to have influenced the development of recreation and tourism in a special geographic area within the states of Washington and Oregon, The Mid• I Columbia Economic Development District. A central question this thesis attempts to answer is: Should the development of recreation and tourist activities be continued as a means of bolstering the lagging economies In the District. Up until this time, the District has been the benefactor of certain state and federal economic development programs whose primary thrust were: to cut unemployment, broaden economic bases In communities with lagging economies, and halt outward migrations of persons to urban areas.

Mount Hood is an Oregon icon. The mountain has as long and rich a history of recreation and tourism as almost any other place in the American West. But contemporary landscapes on Mount Hood reveal a recreation and tourism industry that has struggled to assert itself, and a distinct geographic divide is evident in the manner in which tourism has been developed. Why? In this study I chronicle the historical geography of recreation and tourism on Mount Hood. I examine the evolution of its character and pattern, and the ways in which various communities have used it to invest meaning in the places they call home. Despite the efforts of early boosters, Mount Hood has never been home to an elite destination resort like Aspen, Sun Valley, or Vail. Instead, modest recreation developed alongside timber and agriculture, and today the area is primarily a regional attraction. Unlike destinations with national and international clienteles that play a significant role in shaping lives and landscapes, local and regional interests are the primary drivers of recreation and tourism on Mount Hood. Communities on the mountain have incorporated the industry into their lives and landscapes to varying degrees. Mount Hood is also inextricably tied to Portland, and as an integral part of the city's history and identity, reflects its residents' tastes, values, and priorities. This combination of local and metropolitan interests has left an imprint on Mount Hood that reflects tensions and contradictions that define Oregon in the early twenty-first century: past vs. future, old vs. new economies, urban vs. rural inclinations, progress vs. status quo, and upscale vs. modest tastes. Spatially, temporally, and psychologically, Mount Hood straddles the divide between two visions: a service-based economy in the Willamette Valley, heavily dependent on technology, and a traditional, resource-based economy in much of the rest of the state.