Visitor Travel Research Articles

Visitor attractions, sustainable transport and travel plans – Hadrian's Wall: a case study

Leisure travel accounts for over 40% of distance travelled and over 30% of all personal trips in the UK, most of which are by private car, so it is not surprising that Government policy is beginning to address the impacts of car leisure travel. One initiative is to invite tourist attractions to adopt travel plans, similar to those used by large employers and travel generators in urban areas. This case study researched the views of managers of tourist attractions in a sensitive World Heritage Site – Hadrian's Wall. The in-depth interviews revealed little understanding of how travel plans function, doubts about the effectiveness of ‘carrot and stick’ measures to achieve modal shift and identified conflicts between attempts to reduce car travel and the core purposes of the sites. The study concludes that traffic reduction in tourist areas requires regional involvement and that the benefits of site-based travel plans are limited.

The Sanfte Mobilitaet project: achieving reduced car-dependence in European resort areas

“Sanfte Mobilitaet” was a European Union-funded project designed to assess various approaches to reducing car dependence by visitors, applied in a number of resorts and wider locations within the Alpine region. Visitor attitude surveys were also conducted using existing theories of tourism taxonomy so as to identify optimal changes to transport aspects of the tourism product. This note reports on the project, focusing on two of the chosen locations, and analyses the results in the context of strategies designed to change existing ratios in visitor travel mode.

Endogenously chosen travel costs and the travel cost model: an application to mountain biking at Moab, Utah

The travel cost model is frequently used to estimate net willingness to pay for recreation at remote sites by using the visitor's travel costs as a proxy for the price of recreation. However, some concern has been raised over the validity of using the visitor's stated travel costs as a proxy for price. This paper addresses some of these concerns, by examining the possible over-estimation of consumer surplus due to endogenously chosen travel costs. This paper extends past theoretical work for the linear model by developing a correction for endogenously chosen travel costs in more commonly used nonlinear models such as the Poisson or count data model. Also provided is the first empirical test of the presence of endogeneity and an estimate of the magnitude of the error from ignoring endogeneity in travel costs. After applying this test and the correction to data that was gathered for mountain biking at Moab, Utah the estimate of consumer surplus falls from US $153 to US $135, which is a 12% reduction.

ICT Development and Small Tourism Enterprises in Europe

ABSTRACT Small tourism enterprises make-up a large element of the European tourism economy, notably in hospitality as well as in independent cultural and visitor attractions, travel agencies and tour guides. However, the opportunities and impacts arising from the development of Information Communications Technology (ICT) raise particular problems for the small firm which risks being bypassed in e-commerce and further disadvantaged in marketing and the customer inter-face. This paper discusses the findings of a comparative survey of ICT usage by over 800 SMTEs in three contrasting destination regions—London UK, the Aragon province in Spain and The Netherlands. Within the largely fragmented SMTE supply sectors and regions themselves, the approach to and adoption of ICT has been uneven, whilst the micro-enterprise also differs in its attitude towards ICT in contrast to the medium-sized firm, in some respects refuting the claim that SMEs are simply “lost in the electronic marketplace”.

Multidestination Travel Patterns of International Visitors to Queensland

Tourists frequently undertake multidestination trips to maximize the benefits of travel. A more detailed understanding of this phenomenon contributes to destination marketing by enabling identification of potential multidestination marketing synergies. For individual destinations lacking the critical mass of attractions, such synergies provide a foundation for leveraging strategies. While research has revealed a range of factors associated with variations in travel patterns, no attempt has been made to explore the relative contribution of each factor in a specific context. Research conducted to date has focused primarily on domestic recreational travel (largely in the United States) rather than international tourism. This study uses an Australian database on international visitor travel patterns in Queensland to do this. It is revealed that risk-reduction tendencies associated with long-haul travel, variations in mobility, multiple-benefit seeking, and information sources used by visitors prior to their trip all have a bearing on the level of multidestination travel.

Computer Simulation Modeling for Recreation Management: A Study on Carriage Road Use in Acadia National Park, Maine, USA.

/ The number of visits to outdoor recreation areas has increased dramatically in the last three decades, leading managers and researchers to wonder if there is a limit to the amount of use a resource such as a park can accommodate. One of the difficulties in addressing this carrying capacity-related question has been the complex nature of visitor travel patterns on often extensive networks of roads and trails. Systematic direct observation is often impractical and anecdotal information is usually inadequate. This study explores the utility of computer simulation as a tool for describing visitor travel by building a dynamic model of visitor travel on the carriage roads of Acadia National Park, Maine, USA. The simulation model uses empirical inputs such as travel routes and travel speeds to generate simulated recreation days on the carriage roads. Data on persons-per-viewscape (PPV) conditions were then gathered from multiple model runs and incorporated into the National Park Service's visitor experience and resource protection (VERP) planning process. Results show that PPV conditions under present-day use levels do not violate proposed standards of quality. Results also show likely PPV conditions under scenarios of increasing use and in different areas within the carriage road system. Goodness-of-fit validity tests indicate the model is an accurate representation of the actual system. The findings of this study suggest that computer simulation is useful for estimating current carrying capacity conditions, predicting future conditions, and guiding related research. KEY WORDS: Computer simulation modeling; Carrying capacity; Recreation management; Acadia National Park

Market Segmentation of European and Turkish Travels to North Cyprus

ABSTRACT The main objective of this study is to examine visitor characteristics and travel behavior of European and Turkish travelers visiting North Cyprus. In order to develop an effective marketing strategy, tourism destinations should be aware of the needs, wants, and preferred activities of their target market(s). The analysis of the study data revealed that there are significant differences between the two types of travelers with respect to travel motivations, travel activities, and trip behaviors. It is interesting to note that North Cyprus appears to be doing a good job in satisfying the needs and wants of European visitors but not Turkish visitors. It is suggested that North Cyprus should strive to meet the specific needs of both segments since these two segments make up the major international market of North Cyprus. The visitor database formed from the study may be of help in providing information that could be utilized by tourism officials, hotel and resort managers and travel intermediaries, and entertainment and recreations clubs in North Cyprus.

Report on the annual conference of the association of American geographers

The Recreation, Tourism and Sport Specialty Group of the Association of American Geographers (AAG) organized four special sessions at the Or@nization’s annual meeting held in Washington, DC on April 22 25. 1984. The three oral sessions and one poster session included a total of 15 papers: 13 of which reported on a wide range of tourism topics. Although not organized in any specific manner. the papers conceptually clustered around three themes: tourism hinterlands, environmental perceptions. and economic and physical impacts. Darrell Norris. Adelaide Salisbury, and Leanne Naughton coauthored the paper “Reaching the Sublime: Mid-Nineteenth-Century Niagara Falls Visitor Origins.” They found between 1830 and 1860 that transportation improvement had a profound effect on distance decay models. Visitor profiles at establishments on both sides of the border were found to be similar and weather conditions had an important impact on the size and shape of daily tourist hinterlands. Jerome P. Fournier in his paper “Recreational Hinterland and the Recreational Gravity Model as Applied to Grand Isle, Louisiana” discovered the hinterland of 79 percent of the non-permanent landowners of the island extended well beyond New Orleans. The variables in the gravity model provided stgnificant explanation of the size of the Grand Isle’s catchment basin. The purpose of Robert L. S. Cole, Jr’s paper “Camper Attendance Regions for the Great Smoky Mountains National Park: 1968 and 1983” was to compare the tourist hinterlands of two campgrounds within the national park between 1968 and 1983. The service areas were determined using several measures of attendance and a comparison of the participation regions revealed only minor differences between the time periods. Mark J. Okrant’s research “A Spatial Analysis of New Hampshire’s Fall and Winter Vacation Travel Markets” indicated: New Hampshire is overwhelmingly reliant upon contiguous, proximate, markets: middle range markets produce the greatest numbeaof overnight visits: and the impact of distance decay is more pronounced during the Winter season. The results of the study were based on a sample of visitor socioeconomic backgrounds, travel patterns and accommodation characteristics. “Spatial Structure and Outdoor Recreation Participation” by Stanley R. Lieber was an attempt to associate spatial structure (i.e., hinterlands) with the supply of state parks and the socioeconomic character of park visitors. He discovered within the spatial structure that the variables “actual travel distance” and “number of children in the household” were the most valuable in understanding consumption levels.

Visitor Travel to Nova Scotia 1981. Research Section, Nova Scotia Department of Tourism, P.O. Box 456, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3J 2R5. 1982. 56p

Visitor Travel to Nova Scotia 1981. Research Section, Nova Scotia Department of Tourism, P.O. Box 456, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3J 2R5. 1982. 56p

Visitor Travel to Nova Scotia, 1980. Department of Tourism, Province of Nova Scotia, P.O. Box 456, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3J 1A1. 1981. 48p

Visitor Travel to Nova Scotia, 1980. Department of Tourism, Province of Nova Scotia, P.O. Box 456, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3J 1A1. 1981. 48p

Visitor Travel to Nova Scotia 1976. Department of Tourism, Province of Nova Scotia, P.O. Box 456, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3J 2R5. January 1977. 48p

Visitor Travel to Nova Scotia 1976. Department of Tourism, Province of Nova Scotia, P.O. Box 456, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada B3J 2R5. January 1977. 48p

A Recreational Visitor Travel Simulation Model as an Aid to Management Planning. Robert C. Lucas and Mordechai Shechter. Simulation & Games, vol. 8, no. 3, September 1977, pp. 375-384. Sage Publications, Inc., 275 South Beverly Drive, Beverly Hills, California 90212

A Recreational Visitor Travel Simulation Model as an Aid to Management Planning. Robert C. Lucas and Mordechai Shechter. Simulation & Games, vol. 8, no. 3, September 1977, pp. 375-384. Sage Publications, Inc., 275 South Beverly Drive, Beverly Hills, California 90212

A Recreational Visitor Travel Simulation Model as an Aid to Management Planning

A Recreational Visitor Travel Simulation Model as an Aid to Management Planning

1974 Virginia Visitor Travel Survey. Department of Highways and Transportation, Commonwealth of Virginia, 1221 East Broad Street, Richmond, Virginia 23219. 1975. 97p

1974 Virginia Visitor Travel Survey. Department of Highways and Transportation, Commonwealth of Virginia, 1221 East Broad Street, Richmond, Virginia 23219. 1975. 97p

Visitor Travel to Nova Scotia, 1974. Nova Scotia Department of Tourism, Province of Nova Scotia, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. June 1975. 49p

Visitor Travel to Nova Scotia, 1974. Nova Scotia Department of Tourism, Province of Nova Scotia, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. June 1975. 49p