About the Recreation One-Stop Initiative

Recreation One-Stop is one of the E-Government initiatives in the President's Management Agenda to improve the effectiveness, efficiency, and customer service of the Federal Government.

The initiative will improve access to recreation-related information generated by the various levels of government (Federal, tribal, state, and local), streamline the systems used to manage that information, and increase the sharing of recreation-related information among government and non-government organizations. The investment includes a new contract to integrate the separate National Park Reservation Service and National Reservation Recreation Service with the Recreation.gov website.

The two major goals of the initiative are to provide:
1) a customer-friendly recreation portal with information for planning visits to Federal recreation sites and making campground/tour reservations

2) consistent information about Federal recreation areas via different channels (databases, websites, and publications), by standardizing data and interfacing recreation-related computer systems

Expected results include:
- dramatic improvement in consistency, accuracy, and timeliness of recreation data that is available to the public
- more-seamless experience for customers planning trips and making reservations for Federal facilities
- lower costs for the travel/tourism industry and organizations managing recreation facilities
- implementation of "e-gov" objectives by interfacing/integrating systems for planning trips, announcing events, making reservations, paying fees, distributing maps/publications, etc.

Deliverables will include:
- National Recreation Reservation Service (NRRS), an interagency recreation portal providing campground/tour reservation services and trip planning information for Federal recreation sites
- Recreation Information Data Base (RIDB), a warehouse of information about Federal recreation sites with the ability to export that data to state tourism portals, recreation-related businesses in the private sector, etc.
- RecML data standard
- Blueprints for interfacing different recreation-related computer systems, based on the Federal Enterprise Architecture

National Recreation Reservation Service (NRRS)
The interagency recreation portal will consolidate Recreation.gov, ReserveUSA.com, and reservations.nps.gov to offer a single point of access to information about Federal recreational opportunities and reservations. The new recreation portal at Recreation.gov will provide a comprehensive source of information about thousands of Federal recreation opportunities, plus facilities managed by state, tribal, and local governments and links to other sites with information about private attractions and facilities. Information about recreation opportunities on public lands will be displayed based on the interests of the customer, not centered on the agency providing the recreation opportunity.

Through the new Recreation.gov portal, people planning a trip will be able to:
- Discover which parks, forests, lakes, museums, and other recreation sites managed by government agencies are located near a particular area and/or offer a specific recreational activity (or combination of activities, such as hunting and camping within 20 miles of a particular lake)

- Use interactive maps to locate specific recreation sites managed by government agencies and evaluate their suitability for a planned trip, including potential weather conditions, elevation, and distance to desirable features (public lands, trails, streams/lakes, roads, museums, campgrounds, etc.)

- Identify the schedule of planned events and the operating status of recreation sites managed by Federal agencies (especially in fire season and during floods)

- Determine the entrance fees and use fees for individual recreation sites managed by Federal agencies, and calculate the costs of a trip to visit multiple sites

- Make recreation-related reservations for use of Federal sites via one shopping cart (with the potential for expansion to include ordering entrance passes, paying for recreation-related fees and permits, and conducting other service transactions for a specific trip to Federally-managed recreation sites)

- Provide a user-friendly contact center for customers to make inquiries for planning trips and dealing with transactions for recreation sites managed by Federal agencies

- Link to related recreation information and services provided by non-Federal partners


The recreation portal provided by the NRRS will be the Federal retail outlet for citizens looking for information about Federal recreation sites. The scope of the NRRS is limited to recreation sites managed by Federal agencies. The recreation portal will be designed to handle all aspects of a reservation at a Federal site, but to encourage customers planning a trip to explore other websites with more-detailed information about recreation opportunities.

Except for reservations at Federal facilities, the interagency portal will provide just a "snack" of information, and point to other sources for customers to get the "full meal". The portal is not intended to provide an all-inclusive, one-stop shopping service that would replace non-governmental portals. That goal would lead to unnecessary competition with the many other systems and websites designed for tourism and travel planning.

Recreation Information Data Base (RIDB)
The Recreation Information Data Base (RIDB) will be a warehouse of public domain data about recreation sites managed by Federal agencies. It will implement state-of-the-art technology to share data with other databases, websites, search engines, publications, etc., serving as an authoritative source of accurate, up-to-date information about Federal recreation facilities. RIDB will disseminate reliable, up-to-date information to other organizations so customers can find consistent information about Federal recreation sites, no matter what portals or publications they use. Detailed documentation is available at http://www.recreation.gov/architecture/

RecML data standard
RecML will be a voluntary data standard, adopted by consensus within the recreation community and in stages, starting with RecML 1.0. RecML is intended to streamline the sharing of recreation-related data among Federal, state, tribal, local, and non-government organizations. RecML will reduce the potential for confusion by establishing the common definitions of a variety of terms commonly used for recreation. Detailed documentation is available at http://www.doi.gov/ocio/architecture/modblu/recreation/know.htm

Blueprints for interfacing different recreation-related computer systems
An inventory and analysis of recreation-related systems will allow Federal agencies to plan the replacement of existing "as is" systems. Duplication of effort (and cost) will be eliminated, by developing short-term and long-term migration plans to consolidate or interface different systems. The migration plans will require blueprints for changing existing systems and/or creating new "to be" systems, so different projects led by different organizations at different times can complete the migration over time. These blueprints will be consistent, because they will be based on the Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEA). That effort, led by the Office of Management and Budget, classifies the major activities performed by Federal agencies so computer systems supporting those activities can be synchronized.

Blueprints will be developed and implemented by the partner agencies. Within the Department of the Interior, the Investment Review Board will approve the Recreation Modernization Blueprint, so there is a clear management decision on the schedule to migrate specific systems from the "as is" to the "to be" state.

The NRRS and the RIDB are in the Recreational Resource Management and Tourism component of the Natural Resources line of business, in the Services For Citizens business. Detailed documentation is available at http://www.doi.gov/ocio/architecture/modblu/recreation/know.htm


For more details, see:

- Expanded Electronic Government (President's Management Agenda)