Collaborative environmental planning in river management: an application of multicriteria decision analysis in the White River Watershed in Vermont.
Multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA) provides a well-established family of decision tools to aid stakeholder groups in arriving at collective decisions. MCDA can also function as a framework for the social learning process, serving as an educational aid in decision problems characterized by a high level of public participation. In this paper, the framework and results of a structured decision process using the outranking MCDA methodology preference ranking organization method of enrichment evaluation (PROMETHEE) are presented. PROMETHEE is used to frame multi-stakeholder discussions of river management alternatives for the Upper White River of Central Vermont, in the northeastern United States. Stakeholders met over 10 months to create a shared vision of an ideal river and its services to communities, develop a list of criteria by which to evaluate river management alternatives, and elicit preferences to rank and compare individual and group preferences. The MCDA procedure helped to frame a group process that made stakeholder preferences explicit and substantive discussions about long-term river management possible.
Hermans
Caroline
C
US Geological Survey, 345 Middlefield Road, Menlo Park, CA 94025, USA. chermans@usgs.gov
Erickson
Jon
J
Noordewier
Tom
T
Sheldon
Amy
A
Kline
Mike
M
D003256:Community Participation; D003247:Conservation of Natural Resources; D003362:Cost-Benefit Analysis; D003657:Decision Making; D045483:Rivers; D014707:Vermont; D014881:Water Supply