Abstract
Abstract. Hiking is one of the most popular outdoor sports activities in Hungary. Despite not having many mountainous areas, a wide network of hiking trails crosses the country’s landscapes. As online tourist maps and thematic mobile applications become more and more popular among hikers, the role of paper-based, analogue tourist maps decreases. However, no thematic application has been issued that contains detailed surveyed (or crowdsourced) data on attractions or the natural circumstances (coverage, difficulty) for a certain area in Hungary yet. Nature tourism in the Bükkalja Region, Hungary is mostly based on geological-geomorphological features that are completed with cultural facilities. The length of the hiking trail system is more than 370 km in the examined 354 km2 large sample area. We have developed an OS mobile application that offers guidance for tourists based on four basic pillars: the physical condition of the trails, the attractions along a trail, dangerous trail segments and hiking trail marking quality. These pillars are visualized with an OpenLayers-based online map. The result is a multi-purpose smartphone application. Its main aim is to offer a planning platform for tourists by examining the difficulty of the trails and designating the attractions to visit. There is information on the most important attractions of the area: cultural and geoscientific sites are also presented. We also encourage users to report changes to the map data content via the crowdsourcing menu. These comments and remarks are continuously checked for validity and the database is modified with the use of them.
Highlights
Hiking is an important and popular outdoor activity all over the world
In Hungary, many guides and hiking maps have been issued since the beginning of organised tourism activity in the second half of the 19th century (Hajdú & Pál 2021; Strömpl 1931)
We have planned a smartphone application dedicated to the Bükkalja Region, Hungary, that we chose as a sample area
Summary
Hiking is an important and popular outdoor activity all over the world. People discover new places or routes in the natural environment due to various reasons: they consider hiking as a sporting activity, as a good way to find and explore interesting ecological, geologicalgeomorphological and/or cultural facilities or just as a mean to spend their free time in calm and stressless circumstances (Benkhard 2018, Vizkelety 1986). In Hungary, many guides and hiking maps have been issued since the beginning of organised tourism activity in the second half of the 19th century (Hajdú & Pál 2021; Strömpl 1931) Their main aim was to give aid to tourists when planning their routes before or during the hike: what to visit and which way to choose. Hiking maps have undergone great changes since that time (Hajdú & Pál 2021): paper maps with proper visual solutions and representations are complemented or substituted by digital smartphone map applications (e.g., MTSZ 2021) None of these applications gives hints about the physical attributions of the trails, though these data and information would help tourists with various endurance levels and abilities. We considered important beside the map and its thematic layers that the application could give information on the important sights and tourism infrastructure facilities of the sample area
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