Tourism recreational value of Rock Garden Chandigarh, India
by Pradeep Chaudhry (Arid Forest Research Institute), & Vindhya P. Tewari (Arid Forest Research Institute)
Abstract:
Parks and gardens have significant amenity and recreational value contributing towards quality of urban life. Many of the intangible benefits of such parks/gardens are neither correctly assessed nor incorporated in to benefit-cost analysis of developmental or commercial projects and in budget allocation process, especially in developing countries. Chandigarh, a well-planned and modern city of India, is known for its urban parks and gardens worldwide. Among various tourist places of the city, Rock Garden assumes premier importance for the tourists. Unlike other parks and gardens of the city, it consists of a series of interconnected rocky grottoes, walkways, landscaped waterfalls and thousands of animal or humanoid figures made out of waste and discarded materials. In a case study undertaken during 2002-04 by using travel cost method on the domestic tourists, it was found that this strange and whimsical garden account for about seventy percent of annual recreational use value accruing to the city’s overall urban parks and gardens from the view point of domestic tourists. Key words: Chandigarh, Rock Garden, domestic tourists, travel cost method.
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