Application of Hickman Two stage Model in the investigation of Recreational Valve of Darakeh Mountainous Region

Recent year's population growth and urbanization development has led to increase in demands for natural spaces in the cities. Since these spaces, mostly are among public goods with free access for the public who often use them without receiving admission, the real value of these spaces have been neglected by most visitors and they do not estimate the value of their outing, which can lead to lack of efficient and optimal use of these places. Economic valuations of these spaces not only increase their protection by users, but it creates a good background for planning and management of these spaces by decision makers and planners. In this study the value of Darakeh mountainous region, that is located in northern Tehran, has been estimated by using contingent valuation method.In this study, 216 surveys with various questions have been completed by visitors and they express their willingness to pay for using the site. The factors that affecting the amount of willingness to pay for admission to recreation area, has been evaluated by using Tobit single stage model and Hickman two-stage recreation model. Estimation results by Tobit model shows that willing to pay for using the recreational area of Darakeh has been increased by increasing some variables like income, number of people in household, type of house, the amount of pollution in work place and level of recreational facilities in the mountainous region. With using estimated parameters by linear regression model, the average annual willingness to pay for each visitor in Darakeh mountainous region is equal to 3362/8 Rials ($5) and value per hectare of Darakeh area outing in 1388 was estimated nearly fifty millions Rials ($ 50000).