Promoting Outdoor Recreation and Adventure Tourism on the Russell Fork: An Academic-Community Partnership Report

This community note describes a five-year academic-community partnership between a community organization and two universities in Kentucky. It also documents the potential of adventure tourism to help diversify the community’s economy and contribute to the quality of life in the region. While recognizing that adventure tourism cannot make up for the loss of the area’s traditional economic base, the data indicate that adventure tourism can make a positive contribution to the quality of life, environmental quality, and sustainability of the town. A major obstacle to achieving the community organization’s goals to develop adventure tourism has been the failure to get buy-in from local government leaders.