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Management of tourist flows - Cities and world's art capitals Mara MANENTE - Director Centre International of Study on Tourism Economy (CISET), Venice, Italy
The author would like to thank for their help and support dr. Mirella Cerato and dr. Valeria Minghetti of the CISET research staff.
1. Introduction
The need for a management of tourism based on a system approach is today strongly recognised as a priority. Moreover, it is also being agreed upon that a greater sensibility and concern about the limits - implicit and explicit - of tourism development are convenient for all actors involved in the tourism industry: local businesses, public organisations, the tourists themselves, all those that with tourism constantly have to live with.
The excessive pressure of tourist demand that many destinations are now facing is a threat not only for the integrity of historical and cultural attractions, but also for the vitality of the local economy, the quality of life for residents, constantly harmed by pollution, traffic congestion, changes in the destination economic structure and eventually unease about and rejecting any form of tourism.
On the side of tourism businesses, there is a greater and increasing awareness that policies and strategies for sustainable tourism development are critical success factors for their competitiveness: what stands outside their business is as important as what is inside it and profits in the medium to long run will depend on their ability to preserve primary tourism resources as the utmost important input factor for their business competitiveness on the market.
A number of studies in Europe have focussed on the control of visitor flows in terms of both monitoring tools and strategies (Costa, Manente, van der Borg, 1993 ; Costa, Manente, 1996 ; Vanhove, 1995 ; CISET, 1995 ; Gotti, van der Borg, 1995 ; Richards, 1996 ; CISET, 1998), with special emphasis on traditional art cities.
This paper wants to discuss the main issues stressed by the existing analyses on the basis of the following key themes :
a) the dilemma between preservation and fruition ;
b) the dichotomy between traditional art cities and small historical centres, as well as between famous museums or monuments and less known attractions ;
c) the relevance of the traffic control measures as instruments to manage urban tourism ;
d) the need for measuring and monitoring tourism flows to leading cultural sites and their characteristics.2. The dilemma : preservation vs fruition
The solution of the dilemma between fruition and preservation is a priority for the definition of sustainable tourism strategies and policies.
As far as fruition is concerned, the congestion caused by an excessive tourism pressure is not only detrimental for the resources, but also damages the users of the resource, i.e. the tourists and the local community. This is true especially when considering the relative costs of fruition to be paid by these two types of users, in terms of social and economic externalities generated by the uncontrolled growth of the phenomenon. It goes without saying that, a "reasoned consumption" of the tourism resource can become a vital stimulus for the preservation and exploitation of the resource itself, favouring at the same time the development of sustainable tourism.
Figure 1. The inter-relation between fruition and conservation. Cross effects and impact in terms of quality of the visit and sustainability of tourism.
On the other side, as far as preservation is concerned, the state of the resource itself and of the environment where it is located both represent an important factor influencing tourist demand, i.e. either attraction or repulsion, fundamental element for guaranteeing the destination exploitation and profitability in the long run. The quality of the tourist's experience is in fact strictly linked to the quality of the visit experienced at the main resources but also the perception that the consumer has of the environment where the attraction is located or through which the visit takes place. Nevertheless, an excessive attention to the preservation of the tourism resource can have negative effects on the preservation of the resource itself, when this is not supported by an attentive monitoring and maintenance action, or at least may contribute to worsen tourism flows congestion in limited areas.
Thus, tourism can be defined as "sustainable" when it generates "value" for the local system, i.e. when and if it favours the spring up of a virtuous cycle of development from the economic, cultural and social point of view, which is of vantage for the destination local community.
3. The dichotomy
The evolution of tourism in most important tourist cities/areas is currently characterised by an evident dichotomy. While popular tourist destinations (both cities and single attractions) suffer a dramatic growth in tourist flows, exceeding their maximum carrying capacity, other relevant but less fashionable neighbouring sites are still excluded from traditional tourist itineraries.
Thinking about Venice, for example, the majority of tourist flows are concentrated on the route Piazzale Roma (bus station)-Rialto-San Marco Square, whereas the rest of the historic city remains off this main itinerary. Same situation is experienced by the other historic towns of the Veneto Region, which suffer from the popularity of
Venice - now near to complete congestion - although having historic and cultural attractions of incomparable value but not chosen by tourists that stay in the region (example Treviso).
The congestion caused by excessive tourist pressure seriously damages cultural and environmental heritage in the most famous and crowded resorts, and burdens local residents and visitors with rising use-related costs (Costa, Manente, van der Borg, 1993; Gotti, van der Borg, 1995). The marginal role played by other valuable but less well-known sites, which are located in the same tourist region, does not stimulate visitors to choose alternative itineraries and, in some way, contributes to strengthening the negative effects of spatial concentration. On the other hand, the poor development of such attractions, which are usually occasional destinations for 'in-transit tourism' or 'proximity tourism', causes a deterioration in local natural and cultural resources.
In spite of this, there are interesting signs of change. According to new market trends, tourists are increasingly seeking a varied holiday, which combines a number of attractions and leisure opportunities within the same trip. The interest is no longer in visiting a single famous resort or a number of resorts, but also in exploring the 'context' where they are located. Consequently, the satisfaction experienced by the visitor does not merely depend on the quality of each visit made, but also on his/her perception of the whole tourist region. The understanding of such behaviour and of its implications for the destination (the city, the tourist region, ...) is the basic element for meeting the visitor's expectations, and then for directing promotion and management policies: once the expectations are known, a specific message should be sent to each clientele. One of the aims of such policies, for example, should be a better distribution of the flows, trying to diminish the pressure on the most famous attractions. Promoting alternative itineraries is suggested as one of the viable strategies to spread demand over space (and time) and to stimulate the development of the surrounding area (region or city). It reduces the pressure on overcrowded sites and creates value for all the players involved in such a complex system.
4. Managing tourist flows
In order to control visitor flows -- in particular excursionist flows -- and thus favour the development of sustainable tourism, the planning of suitable management policies should ensure a more balanced and profitable 'use' of the attractions and of the surrounding area, minimising use-related costs and maximising the benefits coming from reputation and 'property value' gained by famous sites. To be effective, such strategies should be planned at different territorial levels.
Then, the development of a synergy between traditional, congested destinations and underdeveloped sites/attractions located within the same tourist region represents a powerful tool for managing tourist demand and creating tourism products that appeal to specific market segments, by integrating a mix of activities, facilities and attractive factors that are defined according to local tourism planning.
The basic assumption is that the actions expressively designed for the management and reorganisation of demand - so as to reduce the tourist pressure heavily concentrated and to distribute it uniformly on the interested area - cannot be derived from fragmented view limited to the destination examined, but should emerge from an integrated approach, where the destination is placed in the middle of a network of relationships with other local tourism attractions in the surrounding environment.
In this context, these actions can be developed either from the supply and the demand side by applying tactics and actions which may differ accordingly: if preservation is more important than fruition or if the resource fruition becomes a tool for its preservation.
Table 1. Management of tourist flows. Actions from the demand and supply side and possible tactics
Source : CISET, 1998
Actions Tactics SUPPLY DEMAND CONTROL STIMULUS These actions can simply be used as a tool for controlling and monitoring the situation, or can become a stimulating and proposing tool for the reorganisation and promotion of new modes of resource utilisation. In addition to that in both cases, the strategies applied can be either hard or soft - and thus may or may not imply actions on the infrastructures - and be implemented according to a given time frame (short term, medium and long term). Furthermore, several can be the actors that may be involved and interested in these activities, according to the type of action decided and the area interested by it.
As far as the actions for demand control are concerned, the studies and projects developed for the case of Venice have firstly highlighted the importance to act on the supply side by developing differentiated and alternative ways of resource usage, which are specifically designed so as to satisfy given target markets as well as being spread in time. The actions on the demand side are to be searched not only in the differentiation of the entrances to the historic town as well as the itineraries and ways of usage, but also in new booking methods for the visit and in new efficient information and promotional strategies. As far as this last aspect is concerned, it needs stressing that actions must be taken not only when the visitor has arrived in the destination but also before he or she leaves home, by involving travel intermediaries and communication channels that directly can reach potential tourist demand.
To this must be added the gradual, widespread and "soft" action of "education and guidance" addressed to the local community and the visitor as well.
In the first case there is a need for actions able to build at all levels the comprehension of and consensus on tourism strategies adopted by developing the "culture of hospitality" that more than ever is the "conditio sine qua non" for maintaining, on one side, destination competitive advantage, and on the other side, social compatibility.
As for the second issue, demand is heavily conditioned by its reference context, which affects its needs and expectations, and its propensity to tourist consumption. However, demand can also be "educated" by the supply side of the tourism system, i.e. guided towards consumption behaviour allowing it to maximise utility and at the same time avoiding negative effects on the system (congestion, resources deterioration, rising costs). This can happen either by adopting information policies (on the spot but also and in particular before departure) or by dissuasive price policies, apart from the limitations and regulations (i.e. traffic limitation), generally enforced by the public administration. If the customer is "educated" to an optimal product fruition, and if he/she can relate in a proper manner with the other consumers and with the residents, perceived quality will be higher, while inefficiencies will be perceived as less critical. This also means that demand behaviour has an effect on the satisfaction of demand itself. Issues like these have already been taken into account in the service sector in order to resolve problems caused by the contemporary presence of producer and user at the moment of service delivery.
5. Tourism flows and mobility management in an urban development strategy
According to recent analyses, European cities are changing from a "space of places" to a "space of flows" and their development will be affected by both physical and virtual mobility. The first one is determined by demographic trends such as growing population, by the increasing numbers of cars and travels, by the evolution of urban tourist flows which are growing much faster than tourism generally, also because of the increasing urbanisation in Europe. The second one is due to the fact that internet, intranets, teleconferencing, email and satellite connections have lead to virtual networks which cover the whole world and have had an enormous impact on the business and institutions within society.
Focusing on tourism, it generally intensifies the mobility and traffic problems already affecting the city: systematic and non systematic mobility, even if characterised by different needs and behaviour, share the same transport network and infrastructures and use the same means of transport. The impact of tourism on the transport system could be sythetised as follows: tourists need, on one hand, fast and efficient transport services to reach the destination (accessibility) and, on the other hand, integrated and flexible transport supply within the destination (urban mobility). The needs of tourists and residents are almost coincident as regards accessibility (even if tourism is characterised by some prevailing routes) while can be different as regards local transports (flexible vs. rigid pattern).
In this context, the need of controlling urban mobility to, from and especially within a city centre in order to optimise the use of transport network and services and to combine efficiently tourists and residents requirements becomes a priority in many European cities. Furthermore, the principles and practices of visitor management in urban areas characterised by large or unusual tourist flows increasingly involve the transport system.
Then, the interaction between tourism and mobility management is becoming more and more fundamental and needs better understanding of the potentialities: the basic question is to what extent the implementation of strategies for controlling tourism demand may affect/direct/influence the adoption of comprehensive measures for mobility management in the whole urban area.
To the analysis of these topics and to the identification of solutions, best practices and proposals in the European context is devoted the ARTIST project. Funded by the European Commission under the "Transport RTD Programme " of the Community's 4th Research and Development Framework Programme it has been launched in January 1999 and it is expected to produce first results by the end of this year.
ARTIST is the first European Community research project linking the areas of transport and tourism and it results from growing awareness of the significance of tourist flows for transport infrastructure and services, and the specificities of tourist transport. It aims "to address the lack of analysis of tourism's significance in transport studies, particularly in relation to the urban sector and to propose solutions to the planning and environmental problems which tourism transport can create in cities. Furthermore, the analysis aims at highlighting the consequences of urban tourism flows on transport, the economy, the environment, employment and land-use planning, making recommendations to both public and private sector players in European tourism, and to the European Commission to assess the need for a specific Commission initiative" (ARTIST, 1999). A sample of European cities (Amsterdam, Barcelona, Canterbury, Glasgow, Rimini, Rome, Toledo) have been selected, to which an alpine tourist region (North Tyrol-Salzburg) and Jerusalem have been added. The case studies provide a good overview of different classes of cities in terms of urban size (the metropolis, the small city, the resort); tourist size (different levels of tourists/residents ratio); economic role of tourism; main market segments (leisure, culture, religion and pilgrimage, sport, business and congress, sun&beach, etc.); mobility characteristics, problems and actions (advanced visitor flows management systems, modal switching, city routes, car access restrictions, car parking facilities, tourist coach management, flexible urban transport systems, etc.).
ARTIST (Agenda for Research on Tourism by Integration of Statistics and Strategies for Transport) organisation: project co-ordinator TNO Inro (Netherland Organisation for Applied Scientific Research); Partners: INRETS (Frace); CISET (Italy), Travel and Tourism Intelligence Group (UK), CTPPR (Israel) ; Associated partners: Consultancy Sammer (Austria), Universidad Complutense de Madrid (Spain), University of Kent (UK).
6. Monitoring visitor flows
The inadequacy of information and/or the lack of reliable data on volume, dynamics and characteristics of visitor flows are considered to be one of the main hindrances to the development of such strategies by public and private organisations. For example, visitor statistics only record the total volume of individuals entering both archaeological sites, without any distinction by nationality or typology (e.g. tourists and same-day visitors). Furthermore, they do not provide any information concerning visitors' motivations and evaluation and the way the visit is organised.
The importance of measuring tourism flows to leading cultural sites -- which are usually visited by all first-time tourists and same-day visitors -- as representative of the tourist pressure affecting not only the resource, but also the whole surrounding area (city, region, etc.), is now generally acknowledged (Vanhove, 1995; Costa, Manente, 1996).
In particular, as a result of new trends in tourism demand, there is a growing need to monitor itinerant visitors. 'Culture' is becoming a mainstream holiday activity in most parts of Europe. The number of cultural visitors has been growing steadily in the last decades, also thanks to the increasing variety of products offered, ranging from classical archaeology, architecture, painting and sculpture, to crafts, industrial archaeology and cultural events (EIU, 1993). On the other hand, long-stay holidaymakers (e.g. beach tourists) are looking for new formulas that combine traditional holidays (e.g. sun & sea) with alternative recreational activities, such as discovering and visiting different cultural attractions during the same trip (museums, historical sites and buildings, etc.). In this context, the concept of 'tourist itinerary' plays a central role.
The estimate of the size of this segment is generally made on the basis of ad hoc surveys that, for their being non systematic and their lacking of homogeneity in the methodology applied, do not facilitate comparison among different case studies.
The evaluation of the weight of day-visitors on total tourist demand is still of extreme importance, especially if considering the variance existing between the effective tourist pressure - in physical, environmental and social terms - generated by this segment on the resources, and the benefits derived for the local community. The spatial and time concentration of these flows generate, in fact, a quick saturation of the carrying capacity for the primary resource, followed by a deterioration of the quality of the stay-visitors' experience and often reduced profits for local economic activities interested by tourism. Such effect interests not only the single attraction of visitor flows but also and especially the context in which it is placed and consequently influence the quality of life for residents (talking about mobility for example and related problems).
The importance of this phenomenon and the consequent need for information sources harmonisation has induced the main international bodies interested (WTO and Eurostat first of all) to ask for the development of survey and monitoring actions at local level based on a given set of recommendation sought to guarantee homogeneity and comparability at least of the main results.
The final aim of both visitor survey and marketing analysis is to define the actions to be developed in order to inform and educate visitors both on site, during their stay in the area, and in their city/region/country of residence, when they are expected to plan their visit. An example of the first type of actions is the promotion of alternative routes within the destination, through a better organisation and delivering of available information to visitors (e.g. electronic kiosks). As for marketing actions, to identify the channels/tools to be used to better organise independent and package visitors and to prevent visitor overcrowding: e.g. the media (TV, radio, magazines, etc.), travel operators, Internet.
Conclusions
This paper has discussed the issue of tourist flows management and the consequent organisation of tourist supply and destination from a system approach stressing coherency, integration and quality of the entire system.
The implementation of policies affecting visitors to traditional cities or attractions is not independent from the development of suitable management strategies for the tourist area where they are located. Furthermore, the high number of players and of decision-making centres involved implies co-ordination of the actions taken by all actors who operate locally. For example, the presence of both independent and package visitors requires a special focus on different players, public and private, that can affect their choices and behaviour.
Tourist flows management is central to the management of the destination in terms of tourism products organisation coherent with market segments targeted on the basis of tourism development strategies. This issue reflects the delicate interaction between tourism and environment in all of its aspects: a system where the actors involved benefit from tourism and contribute to its costs in different ways, have different and diversified interests and objectives, and thus perceive and value costs and benefits subjectively. The visitors' goal consists on maximising the utility/satisfaction from the visit; tourism activities maximise their profits until they reach the optimum use of the factors of production; the host population aims at maximising the quality of life until the optimum level of welfare is reached. On the attainment of this goal act : a) the maximisation of net benefits in,terms of both market impacts (revenues and employment) and the surplus of positive externalities over the negative ones (control of the social carrying capacity, the level beyond which the balance between benefits and costs generated by tourism indicates a negative result) ; b) the maximisation of the consensus in terms of attitude towards visitors and tourism activities, participation in the definition of goals, actions and policies, and the development of the hospitality culture.
It is not an easy task to accommodate all the different players without a clear strategy of exploitation which has as its objective the creation of value for each actor -visitors included-and for the whole system. This strategy should be precise enough to take specific promotional steps when necessary or to check demand evolution by adhering, in both cases, to product/market principles. Moreover this is necessary to overcome the two extremes "to preserve at all costs" (typically of the public sector) or "to make profit at all costs" (typically of the private sector).
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