Abstract
Slow tourism is a growing phenomenon in Italy; it is assuming a key role in the definition of new strategies for sustainable tourism for the enhancement of landscape and cultural heritage, but also as a driver for the revitalization of marginalized and inner areas of the country. In this framework, the aesthetical phenomena related to seasonal landscape changes (e.g., autumn coloring foliage, spring blooming, controlled paddy-rice fields flooding) that occur in specific environments are emerging as new tourist destinations and are of major interest for the experiential tourism sector. This research shows a GIS-based method to draw up parametric slow tourism itineraries, which are defined according to seasonal landscape changes, by exploiting the high frequency of Sentinel-2 data acquisition. The algorithm defines parametric itineraries within the network of existing local roads by detecting the current landscape conditions through NDVI. The algorithm has been tested in the study area, within the historical agricultural landscape of paddy-rice fields in between Turin and Milan, where high scenic conditions related to the flooding occur over the spring season. This tool can support a range of end users’ decisions for the creation of a widespread tourist destination offer year-round, with the aim to promote more sustainable and balanced use of the places and reduce overpressures in the most frequented places.
Highlights
In the last decade, the initiatives related to sustainable tourism and to the phenomenon of slow tourism, walking and cycling, have grown in Italy as an opposite form to mass tourism [1,2]
This section is about the method, described as a sequence of work steps, which allows the definition of the algorithm, which is able to draw up parametric slow tourism itineraries for experiencing seasonal landscape changes
The main outcomes of the research are the parametric slow tourism itineraries which are mapped according to seasonal landscape changes
Summary
The initiatives related to sustainable tourism and to the phenomenon of slow tourism, walking and cycling, have grown in Italy as an opposite form to mass tourism [1,2]. The experience economy, mainly based on the active participation of the users and on the strong environmental relationship with surrounding space, shows that consumers unquestionably desire experiences [10], but they are seeking unusual places to visit and new activities to undertake [7]. In this framework, new locations characterized by high scenic phenomena related to the seasonal landscape changes (e.g., spring blooming, autumn coloring foliage, controlled floods in the countryside) are emerging as new tourist destinations [11,12]. Landscape and tourism are strongly interlaced, in the sense that landscape, especially when it is considered
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