Ranking and Calculation Methodology
Explore the different methods, formulas, and criteria used in our ranking system.
Evaluation Method
Learn about the evaluation method used to grade beaches and its impact on the ranking.
Beach Prioritization Framework
The «Beach Prioritization Framework» is a methodology consisting of indicators that recognize the functions and ecosystem services of a beach, measured through a scoring system that allows for direct comparisons. The framework provides a global vision, addresses key management shortcomings, and highlights the strengths and weaknesses of each beach.
The graphic result summarizes a vast amount of information while educating users on environmental issues. Furthermore, the framework can standardize classification methodologies, reducing subjectivity and allowing tourists and managers to compare beaches and understand the criteria used to classify them.
Framework Structure
The structure of the beach prioritization framework was designed based on the «Circles of Sustainability» framework (James, 2015). Circles of Sustainability is an assessment framework, based on the theory of social-ecological systems (SES), to measure urban sustainability through a holistic approach by assigning scores to categories divided into four domains.
The domains of the framework were adapted to reflect the main functions of a beach: coastal defense, recreation, and conservation, in addition to reflecting sanitary conditions. Each domain is divided into five categories that include their key elements.
Framework Dimensions
Recreational Dimension
Refers to the provision of services and infrastructure that allow beach users to relax, have fun, and be entertained.
Protection Dimension
Includes indicators that assess the potential of the beach to dissipate energy and defend inland areas against potential harmful events. The criteria identify vulnerabilities and anthropic modifications that can damage the natural defense of the coast.
Conservation Dimension
Refers to the preservation of the environment, including indicators to measure biodiversity, environmental quality, and the management of conservation efforts.
Sanitary Dimension
Aims to identify the presence and impacts of litter and pollution.
Indicators
Each domain is divided into five categories, and each category is measured by a variable number of indicators. Indicators are data or pieces of information that allow us to know, describe, classify, compare, or assess the characteristics and intensity of a reality or to determine its future evolution.
In the environmental field, indicators are a quantitative measure of the health of the surroundings, indicating pressures, evolutionary state, and the suitability of policy measures. The indicators of the beach ranking are shown in the figure.
Weighting by Beach Type
Finally, each type of beach has a specific weighting to reflect its management reality:
Urban Beaches
The recreational and sanitary aspects carry greater weight. They are known for their development and range of services and amenities. The conservation dimension has the lowest weighting, as they are highly modified, and natural elements are not expected to remain intact.
Rural Beaches
The conservation aspect is the most important. They are known for their natural state. The low weighting of recreational criteria aims to prevent the modification and urbanization of these beaches, protecting and maintaining their natural characteristics.
Village Beaches
All areas have a similar weight. They represent the transition between urban and rural beaches, so a mix of elements is expected.
Specific Weightings by Dimension
Recreational Dimension
- Scenic value and carrying capacity have higher priority in rural and village beaches.
- Safety was considered the most important factor in urban beaches.
- Services & infrastructure and access & parking have a higher weight for urban beaches and a lower weight for rural ones.
Conservation Dimension
- Environmental quality is the most important category for urban beaches.
- The habitat criterion carries more weight for rural beaches.
- Village beaches show an average weight distribution across all criteria.
Protection Dimension
- Village beaches have high weighting for sub-aerial dissipation and storm buffering.
- Vulnerability and risk is the most important category for urban beaches.
- Rural beaches are more influenced by the induced changes criterion.
Sanitary Dimension
- Village beaches have high weightings for water quality and litter criteria.
- Urban beaches are more influenced by episodic pollution.
- Rural beaches have sand quality and litter criteria as the most important.
- Sanitary facilities and services have the lowest weighting for all beach types; however, the weight of this criterion is higher in urban beaches.
Evaluation Process
Understand the evaluation process followed to grade beaches and its impact on the ranking.
The prioritization framework is divided into the stages outlined in the figure below.
First Stage
The first stage is the registration of evaluators. This stage aims to create the profile of individuals interested in becoming ranking evaluators. Likewise, each evaluator must identify the beaches they wish to work on and their specific experience with them. These data are used to create the evaluator's Credibility Index.
Second Stage
The second stage is the collection of information about each beach, including physical or virtual visits, reading scientific, governmental, or outreach publications, project results, among others. This stage is personal and must reflect general knowledge about the beach's behavior over time. Overall, each evaluator is expected to update their experience and knowledge of the 20 evaluation criteria beforehand.
Third Stage
As a third step, each criterion must be scored using the electronic form provided by the ranking's coordinating team. In this form, the evaluator must select the option that best describes the status of each indicator on their beach. Selecting an option on the form scores each prioritization category. At the end of the evaluation, the assigned values are sent to the coordinating team through the platform for processing. The equations used to calculate the overall quality score and the individual performance of each beach by domain are described in detail in Oliveira (2022).
Once the application period is closed, all evaluated beaches will be analyzed, graphs and tables with the results will be generated for dissemination, and the results report will be published.
Credibility Index
Explore how the credibility index is calculated and its importance in beach evaluation.
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The Credibility Index aims to demonstrate the evaluator's reputation and the reliability of the evaluation conducted. This value is calculated individually per beach. Consequently, the same evaluator may have different indices for different beaches, depending on their expertise and experience in each of them. The index consists of a set of five criteria:
- Level of education, ranging from formal undergraduate and/or postgraduate education to specialized courses such as those offered by CIFPLAYAS.
- Most recent beach visit, in timeframes ranging from visiting the beach specifically for the evaluation to not having visited it more than once in the last year.
- Prior experience, specific and certified, on the beach to be analyzed. The type of experience may include papers, projects, consultancies, public campaigns, certifications, written texts, press appearances, audiovisual materials, and/or contact with beach stakeholders.
- Years of experience in topics related to beach management, in any of the disciplines or roles that a beach manager may hold.
- Ranking training, including reading the available manual and participating in meetings, but above all having completed the mobile expert-level course of the Ranking on the CIFPLAYAS platform.
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Compliance with each criterion is scored from 1 to 5, as shown in the table below. Subsequently, the values are summed and normalized by dividing the obtained score by the maximum value (25). The final index score is disclosed on a scale of 0 to 1. The closer it is to 1, the higher the evaluator's credibility index for the studied beach, making the evaluation result more reliable.
Hypothetical Calculation Examples
Discover practical examples of how the ranking formulas are applied in real-life situations.
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Evaluator 1: José
José has a degree in Geography, and a Master's and PhD in Environmental Management. José evaluates Balela beach, where he has worked for 30 years and visits every month. He has research projects developed in that region, has published scientific articles, and participated in the production of audiovisual materials on environmental education on that beach. Additionally, he has access to a wide network of contacts on the beach. Finally, José has participated in all phases of the training on the prioritization framework.
In this example, José scored each criterion with the maximum score. When normalizing the value, José's credibility index for Balela beach is equal to 1. Assigning the highest score reflects his knowledge and years of experience on this specific beach.
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Evaluator 2: María
María is an oceanographer and is pursuing a Master's degree in geosciences. María is also evaluating Balela beach, which she has known for 10 years. The last time María visited the beach was a year ago and she does not know many people there who can support her remotely. She has a published scientific article, but no other materials. Finally, she has participated in all training phases.
In this example, María obtained a credibility index for Balela beach of 0.6.
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Evaluator 3: Juan
Juan is an oceanography student evaluating Balela beach. He is starting his professional life, so he has very little experience working with beaches and does not have any type of published material about the place. Juan visited the beach this week and has completed the entire course to become an evaluator.
Summing the points, Juan scored 13 out of 25, which means his credibility index is equal to 0.5.
Prioritization Framework
Learn about the methodology behind our ranking system and how it is implemented in practice.
The analysis of beach quality is based on 4 dimensions and 20 categories. Each category is measured through indicators, which are scored on a scale of 1 to 5, taking into account management and sustainability. Beaches have scores to differentiate between beach types (urban, rural, or village).
Maria is an oceanographer pursuing a master's degree in geosciences. Maria is also going to evaluate Balela beach, which she has known for 10 years. The last time Maria visited the beach was a year ago, and she does not know many people there who can support her remotely. She has one published scientific paper but no other materials. Lastly, she has participated in all training phases. In this example, Maria obtained a credibility index of 0.6 for Balela beach.
- The numbers in red represent the Beach Quality Index obtained for each evaluated beach, ranging from 0 to 1, where values closer to 1 indicate that the evaluated beach was of higher quality considering the four dimensions: recreation (yellow), protection (pink), conservation (green), and sanitation (blue). The border refers to the beach type: gray for urban, orange for village, and green for rural.
Ranking Users
Learn about the users of our ranking system and how it is implemented in practice.
Different readers can benefit from using the framework in different ways.
Managers
They can examine the individual results of their beach to identify weak areas requiring management, allowing them to implement targeted actions in those areas with the goal of improving their score and climbing the ranking.
Tourists
They can use the table of best beaches to reliably decide on their next destination, or use the individual performance charts to select the beach that best suits their needs (for example, a beach with good access and safety for children).
The Press
They can use the content of the framework to create tourist materials such as guides to the best beaches, brochures, and posters. The tourism industry will also benefit from the framework since promoting the ranking can attract tourists to their region, boosting tourism and creating more opportunities for service provision.
Hotels
They can use the results to attract more guests while expanding their service offerings, generating new jobs, and boosting the local economy.
Communication Framework
Learn about the communication framework used to present the beach ranking results.
Graphical Representation of the Prioritization Framework
Since the classification itself does not explain why a particular beach is in a specific position, representing the overall performance of the beach with a visual result rather than a numerical value is essential. The graphic can provide a friendly and simple perspective of beach quality in each domain, offering better communication for coastal managers and tourists.
With this goal in mind, a graphic was created, inspired by combining the visual output of two existing social-ecological system frameworks: the "Circles of Sustainability" (James, 2015) and the "Ocean Health Index" (Halpern et al., 2012).
The graphical representation of the beach prioritization framework allows for the visualization of the beach's performance in each domain, facilitating data communication and interpretation. The graphical result enables users to understand why a beach occupies a specific position in the ranking and helps managers identify which categories could be improved to elevate its status.
Color System and Representation
Colors have been defined for the domains, being recurring throughout the methodology and always representing the same dimension:
The axis of the graphs shows the normalized score for each analyzed indicator and ranges from 0 to 1, with one being the highest value at the outer edge (the fuller the slice, the better the beach's performance in that specific category). The final value of each beach is displayed in the circle at the center of the graph.
Weighting by Beach Type
Finally, each type of beach has a specific weighting to reflect its management reality:
Urban Beaches
The recreational and sanitary aspects carry greater weight. They are known for their development and range of services and amenities. The conservation dimension has the lowest weighting, as they are highly modified, and natural elements are not expected to remain intact.
Rural Beaches
The conservation aspect is the most important. They are known for their natural state. The low weighting of recreational criteria aims to prevent the modification and urbanization of these beaches, protecting and maintaining their natural characteristics.
Village Beaches
All areas have a similar weight. They represent the transition between urban and rural beaches, so a mix of elements is expected.
Specific Weightings by Dimension
Recreational Dimension
- Scenic value and carrying capacity have higher priority in rural and village beaches.
- Safety was considered the most important factor in urban beaches.
- Services & infrastructure and access & parking have a higher weight for urban beaches and a lower weight for rural ones.
Conservation Dimension
- Environmental quality is the most important category for urban beaches.
- The habitat criterion carries more weight for rural beaches.
- Village beaches show an average weight distribution across all criteria.
Protection Dimension
- Village beaches have high weighting for sub-aerial dissipation and storm buffering.
- Vulnerability and risk is the most important category for urban beaches.
- Rural beaches are more influenced by the induced changes criterion.
Sanitary Dimension
- Village beaches have high weightings for water quality and litter criteria.
- Urban beaches are more influenced by episodic pollution.
- Rural beaches have sand quality and litter criteria as the most important.
- Sanitary facilities and services have the lowest weighting for all beach types; however, the weight of this criterion is higher in urban beaches.
Benefits of Visual Representation
- Provides a friendly and simple perspective of beach quality in each domain
- Offers better communication for coastal managers and tourists
- Allows for the visualization of the beach's performance in each domain
- Facilitates data communication and interpretation
- Helps to understand why a beach occupies a specific position in the ranking
- Assists managers in identifying which categories could be improved