Purpose
To provide a consistent formal beach attendance monitoring program to improve the reliability, accuracy and range of data collected with regards to beach visitation.
Policy
An evidence-based approach can be used to inform decisions on lifesaving service provisioning and resource allocation and assist with procuring funding.
Attendance is captured and broken down into 4 specific areas:
- In the water inside the flags
- In the water outside the flags
- On the beach
- Craft
Procedure
Lifesaving services should have the same methodology and procedures for observing and estimating beach attendance.
Visual scanning techniques utilised for effective water observation can also be applied for estimating on beach visitation figures.
The technique described below is subjective and is estimate based, however with additional checks and balances in place there should be improved confidence and faith in the figures.
Definitions
- Attendance: Shall include the total number of people in the water and on the beach in the area specified.
- Area: Shall be the area defined as the primary and secondary patrolling areas (up to 200m either side of the flags).
Grouping Technique
- During observation, personnel should break the beach/water up into smaller representative groups.
- Count the number of people in one such group.
- Multiply the number of beach users in that group by the total number of groups contained on the beach.
- It may be appropriate to estimate on beach and in water separately and then combine to give a total beach attendance.
- This method is still subjective and if the representative group is poorly selected the total beach attendance figure can be significantly affected.
Beach Attendance = Group Total X Total Number of Groups
Figure 1
Example
In Figure 1, the beach has been split into 18 groups. Group number 4 has been selected as having an average representative number of attendees. Approximately 51 attendees can be counted in group 4. When multiplied out across the 18 groups, this gives and approximate attendance figure of 918 people.
Beach Attendance = Group Total A x Total Number of Groups
Beach attendance 918 = 51 × 18
Reporting
Beach attendance should be collected at the start of each patrol and every hour thereafter and entered into the Operations App where available or patrol log book.
Beach attendance shall include the number of people in the water and on the beach at each of the specified times.
Data must be collected and recorded on Patrol Logs to be entered into SurfGuard within 14 days (as per SOP 3.1). Data entered via the Operations App must be approved and closed in SurfGuard by the Club Captain within 14 days.
Reference
Brewster, C B 2003, ‘Open Water Lifesaving – The United States Lifesaving Association Manual’, United States Lifesaving Association, New Jersey, USA.