Available time is the ultimate precondition to leisure and recreation participation. For those interested in visiting relatively remote protected areas, time must not only be available, it must be available in relatively large chunks so that travel to/from and enjoyment of the visit is possible.
The average adult Canadian has access to 6.2 hours of discretionary or leisure time per day. Over the past decade, this has remained virtually stagnant; Statistics Canada reports a gain of only 5 minutes per day between 1992 and 1998. The chart below is taken from ‘The time of our lives: Juggling work and leisure over the life cycle’ (1998).
The pattern of use of leisure time seems relatively fixed with very little difference between data collected in 1992 and 1998 – see table below. The big consumers of discretionary time are watching TV (36% of available time), socializing (31%), sports (8%), civic/voluntary activity (6%), reading (6%), other active leisure activities (8%), movies/entertainment (3%), and other passive leisure activities (2%). Outdoor activities compete for attention in the sport and ‘other’ active or passive leisure activities – the total of these categories occupying only 18% of leisure or discretionary time.
Activity | 1992 hrs per day | 1998 hrs per day | Difference in minutes |
paid work upaid work (housework, children) education sleep, meals and personal care | 3.6 3.2 0.6 10.5 | 3.6 3.2 0.6 10.4 | 2.0 0.0 1.0 -0.7 |
free time civic and voluntary activity socializing | 6.1 0.4 1.8 | 6.2 0.4 1.0 | 5.0 1.0 5.0 |
watching TV reading other passive leisure movies/other entertainment | 2.2 0.5 0.1 0.1 | 2.2 0.4 0.1 0.2 | 1.0 -6.0 -1.0 4.0 |
active leisure acitve sports other active leisure | 1.0 0.5 0.5 | 1.0 0.5 0.5 | 1.0 3.0 -1.0 |
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