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Arikok National Park Sets New Guidelines for Motorized Recreation

Cunucu Arikok Aruba
Cunucu Arikok

Author: Arikok National Park

Fundacion Parke Nacional Aruba’s (FPNA) mission is to conserve Aruba’s natural and cultural heritage for future generations, while inspiring and engaging the local community and visitors to do the same. The Foundation’s existing policy of allowing, yet discouraging, unregulated motorized mass/adventure recreation inside our protected areas impedes FPNA in its ability to effectively conserve those areas under its care.

Consistent with FPNA’s role as an independent authority in terms of nature conservation, sustainability, and lending a voice for Aruba’s collective nature consciousness, the park is implementing new measures to regulate the motorized mass/adventure recreation while enabling a more sustainable approach to recreation.

Execution of FPNA’s policy on managing the conflict between nature conservation and adventure tourism is based on a three-phased approach. Phase one, which will be in effect as of June 1, 2020, will entail a complete halt on entrance for All Terrain Vehicles (ATV), Utility Terrain Vehicles (UTV), Motorcycles, Buggies, and Trikes. Further, ATV’s, motorcycles, buggies, trikes and other types of motorized high-impact vehicles are expressly banned from all nature protection areas under FPNA’s management.

During a transitory phase, which is scheduled to end on October 31, 2020, FPNA will allow entrance to UTVs under the strict condition that they are part of a guided visit with a tour operator registered with FPNA. Additionally, there will be limitations in regards to caravan size and frequency of daily entrance.

The first phase will also entail a halt of new registrations of motorized tour operators to operate in the protected areas managed by FPNA, which will render greater opportunity to manage current registrations.

The phases of the policy are designed to regulate undesired traffic inside protected areas managed by FPNA, but also encourage sustainable recreation in the form of low impact tours. The policy document is available on the park’s website: www.arubanationalpark.org.

FPNA foresees that with these sets of policies, it will not only curb the unregulated mass/adventure tourism, it will also foster sustainable recreation inside the protected areas under management of FPNA. Lastly, FPNA will periodically evaluate this policy and adapt accordingly to the benefit of nature conservation and the safety of all visitors alike.

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