Identifying and mapping forest-based ecotourism areas in West Virginia – Incorporating visitors' preferences

• Integrates visitors' preferences with the physical settings to identify and map ecotourism areas.
• Visually displays the impact of visitors' preferences in the classification of ecotourism destinations.
• Incorporating visitors' preferences provide helpful information in terms of destination development, marketing, and promotion.

This study identifies and maps forest-based ecotourism areas in West Virginia by incorporating visitors' preferences. Relative weights for ecotourism destination criteria were obtained using the Analytic Hierarchy Process based on a survey of 777 participants. The study classified the state into five levels of naturalness with areas under Class I being the least natural and Class V being the most natural. The presence of wildlife was found to be the most important criterion and slope was found to be the least. Results also showed significant variations in visitors' preferences. Areas under Class IV and Class V in both weighted and unweighted ecotourism maps covered more than half of the state's area, suggesting high prospects for promoting forest-based ecotourism in the state. The results further showed that each class changed in size when visitors' preferences were applied. The ecotourism maps created provide useful insights for visitors, destination managers, and decision makers.