Abstract
Tourism is considered to be an engine for socioeconomic development and a tool to alleviate the problems of different regions and, specifically, of industrial zones. Furthermore, from this standpoint, industrial tourism tries to harness any potential cultural interest that visitors may have in industrial heritage. Using this as a starting point, the general objective of this research is to analyse industrial tourism’s contribution to local development in four case studies that form part of the industrial tourism in Spain and Portugal. For this purpose, a quantitative methodology has been proposed and designed through surveying the local population, the results of which show that the tourism type analysed has positive impacts on each of the local development capitals or dimensions (symbolic, heritage, social, human, economic and infrastructure). Likewise, it has also been discovered that the impacts perceived by the local population are related to the intrinsic characteristics of the territory itself, due to the destination’s degree of tourist development, as well as to the attitudes shown by the local population towards industrial tourism, among other factors.
Highlights
Heritage and tourism have been identified as key drivers of socioeconomic development, which is why it is increasingly common to consider tourism as an effective tool to alleviate the challenges of decline in different regions and, as in the case of this study, of industrial areas (Edwards and Coit 1996; Llurdés i Coit 1999; Hospers 2002; Castillo Canalejo et al 2010; Prat Forga and Soria 2014), where the aim is to take advantage of the potential cultural interest that visitors have in industrialisation heritage, by promoting a connection between tourism and local development, based on harmony and the principles of sustainability (Pardo Abad 2017)
Regarding the significance of the values included in the factor examined, it should be noted that it is significant since p > z is 0.000, as corroborated in the following Table 16: according to the results obtained from the surveys taken of the local population and through an analysis in which the confirmatory factor analysis technique has been applied, the theoretical proposal presented throughout this research has been simplified in a single multidimensional model or structure of local development composed of three factors or dimensions (Economic Dimension, Socio-Cultural Dimension and Symbolic-Heritage Dimension), which are independent but, at the same time, are interconnected and with a certain degree of interdependence (See Figure 8)
Tourism is an opportunity for local development in many territories
Summary
The debate on the role of tourism in local development is ongoing and numerous studies have been carried out on this subject Heritage and tourism have been identified as key drivers of socioeconomic development, which is why it is increasingly common to consider tourism as an effective tool to alleviate the challenges of decline in different regions and, as in the case of this study, of industrial areas (Edwards and Coit 1996; Llurdés i Coit 1999; Hospers 2002; Castillo Canalejo et al 2010; Prat Forga and Soria 2014), where the aim is to take advantage of the potential cultural interest that visitors have in industrialisation heritage, by promoting a connection between tourism and local development, based on harmony and the principles of sustainability (Pardo Abad 2017) These considerations have led to a greater awareness and appreciation of industrial heritage by society that can be successful in initiatives that contribute toward the enhancement of this type of heritage (Cañizares Ruiz 2008). The paper concludes with the results and arguments of our findings
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