The creation of the Coastal Tourist Corridor arises from the analysis of the tourism’s potential of the communities next to the Marine Management Area (MMA) Bahía Santa Elena, whose participatory governance model is led by the Local Council (COLAC) of this MMA.

COLAC is a formal structure attached to the Regional Council (CORAC) of the Conservation Area of Guanacaste, whose vision is "to be a model of regional governance in the sustainable management of coastal marine resources and their ecosystem services, for the benefit of neighboring communities and society in general".

The ACG seeks to generate governance models, which is recognized as "interactions between structures, processes, and traditions that determine how responsibility is assumed and the power is exercised, how decisions of public interest are made and how citizens and other sectors raise their positions. The governance of natural resources and protected wilderness areas depends on the history, culture, traditional rights, access to information, market presence, financial flows, and a variety of informal influences in decisions." (MINAE 2016. Governance Decree in Protected Wilderness Areas.)

Through participatory work, supported by Association Costa Rica por Siempre and the Waitt Foundation in the neighbor communities of the MMA, various opportunities for insertion into the tourism value chain and the sustainable use of fishery resources have been visualized.

The proposal of a Coastal Tourist Corridor, as well as the formation of the service to offer organizations integrated into the CTC, are the result of the support of these entities, COLAC and the Guanacaste Conservation Area.