Tourism Management 23 (2002) 631637

Case Study

Planning considerations for cultural tourism: a case study of four European cities
Antonio P. Russoa,*, Jan van der Borgb
a

EURICUR and Tinbergen Instituut, Erasmus University of Rotterdam, Kamer H 12-31, Postbus 1738, 3000 DR Rotterdam, The Netherlands b " Universita Ca Foscari di Venezia and EURICUR, Erasmus University of Rotterdam, Dip. Scienze Economiche, Ca Foscari University, 30100 Venice, Italy

Abstract Utilising the information gathered in four European cities, this paper discusses and tests a framework of reference for visitorfriendliness, a complex concept that encapsulates the main dimensions of the urban tourism product such as its quality, accessibility and image projection. This concept is particularly relevant to assess whether investments in culture and hospitality genuinely respond to the impulses coming from the market. The case studies highlight how specic soft elements of the urban tourism product are the ones that matter most in determining the attractiveness of a city for international visitors, and yet they are often overlooked by city planners. The paper also identies a number of best practice in tourism management. r 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Cultural tourism; Visitor-friendliness; Urban regeneration; Accessibility

1. Introduction An increasing number of European cities have selected tourism as a strategic sector for local development. The tourism industry, one of the fastest growing at the global scale, generates jobs and income especially in those layers of the job market that are most severely disadvantaged by economic conjuncture of variables including non-specialised work, reputedly low-skills part-time jobs and female work. By investing in cultural attractions and infrastructure, cities seek to secure a niche position in the international tourism map, developing an industry that is sustainable and plentiful in synergies with other strategic sectors of the urban economy. Tourism also represents an indispensable source of nancial resources for the preservation and restoration of the heritage that otherwise faces shrinking budgets and state transfers. Yet this rosy scenario presents many contradictions that tourism policy has to recognise and solve. First and foremost, not all cities possess a
*Corresponding author. Tel.: +31-10-4081578; fax: +31-104089153. E-mail addresses: russo@few.eur.nl (A.P. Russo), vdborg@unive.it (J. van der Borg).

sufcient mass in terms of cultural assets to develop a viable tourism industry. Thus, existing resources have to be promoted in conjunction with other forms of tourist attractions, spanning from events, to gastronomy, highquality infrastructure and whole regional networks, without losing from sight the necessity to bring about a diverse, original and attractive image. Second, tourism development brings with it peculiar problems and costs, that may hamper the long-term viability of these very developments. It is therefore necessary that the tourism planners are able to anticipate such tendencies, bringing together development and sustainability, on more than one scale: the spatial, the socio-economic and obviously the environmental. Lastly, tourism development requires that a number of basic conditions regarding the quality of hospitality are met; these are only loosely connected with the quality or state of heritage preservation, but involve parallel elds that are often beyond the control of planners. Such examples include communication with the public, the accessibility of the destination and its attractions and the atmosphere of the place; aspects that are often, arguably, neglected in cultural and tourism planning (Garrod & Fyall, 2000). Such conditions require that city governments have both an organising capacity and entrepreneurial skill, in order to act

0261-5177/02/$ - see front matter r 2002 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved. PII: S 0 2 6 1 - 5 1 7 7 ( 0 2 ) 0 0 0 2 7 - 4

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coherently with the demands arising from the marketplace, without overlooking the interests and aspirations of the players variously involved in the process of tourism development. The present article focuses on the latter aspect, highlighting the relationships between a consumeroriented management strategy for the system of cultural resources and other layers of tourism policy. This is done through the presentation of a series of case studies carried out by European Institute for Comparative Urban Research (EURICUR), utilising the uninformed visitor approach. Researchers follow on the heels of the typical visitor, who, once he or she has selected the destination of his journey on the basis of generic information, organises a eld itinerary according to the suggestions received once he or she gets there, and enjoys a tourist experience whose quality may eventually motivate future re-visiting. The cities selected for the researchLyon, Lisbon, Rotterdam and Turinpresent a series of features that are utilised to test a reference framework of their visitor-friendliness.

2. Cultural tourism: problems and opportunities Economic scientists, as well as cultural, geographical and sociological scholars have been involved in a debate for at least two decades that seeks to clarify the relation between destinations development and the use-management-production of the assets on which such development is originally based. In the case of cultural tourism, the issue is that of the wise exploitation of the heritage for tourist use. In the plethora of issues, methods, recommendations, and caveats generated by such discussion, two themes emerge as particularly fertile for practical policy developments:
*

the compatibility between the development of a tourism industry and the preservation of the heritage out of the market; the existing and potential synergies and tensions between the global tourism system and the local socio-economic development.

Cultural heritage may be conceived as a precious resource for the community, rather than a nancial burden for the local economy. It therefore requires balanced utilisation, according to the general principles and practice of sustainability, orless abstractlyof the optimal use of (partially) non-reproducible resources. By this is generally meant: the exploitation of many of the opportunities offered by heritage while simultaneously respecting the ethical features and integrity of the heritage itself. However, there is an important economic problem that threatens to undermine the viability of this process: namely that tourist demand directed towards a locality is generally not

constrained by the capacity of the site to meet given functionality standards (Costa & Van der Borg, 1988; Martin & Uysal, 1990). Therefore, it is likely that problems of mismatch in the production of tourist services emerge at the heritage site itself (Fossati & Panella, 2000) and may result in a reduction of the quality experienced by visitors (Keane, 1997). In particular circumstances (Russo, 2002), this implies a certain difculty for cultural cities to maintain their attraction capacity over time. Additionally, the valorisation process occurs within a well-dened sociocultural contextthat of the transition towards postmodern forms of organisation of the society and the economythat inuence its structure and outcomes. The contemporary city isaccording to authors such as Urry (1990) and Britton (1991) the locus of consumption. The cultural experience becomes a holistic process, where producer and consumer cohere in a gazer who identies a symbolic signicant. The barrier between the heritage asset and the scenario that shapes the heritage experience becomes increasingly blurred. In this context, two elementsalmost in contradiction, but interrelateddetermine the success of a tourist destination (or post-tourist, as it is dened with subtle irony by Urry, 1990). The rst is the necessity to create a tourist infrastructure of international standards and with a high degree of predictability that allows the destination to be attractive, not so much to the individual tourist, but rather to the tourist industry, and in particular to the trans-national players that dominate it. This means that destinations have to become increasingly similar one another to be competitive; the risk is high that in this process of standardisation the distinctive elements of places become eroded. The second is presence of increasingly fragmented impulses coming from the marketplace, to which destinations and operators respond proposing a super-segmentation (Go & Pine, 1995) of tourist products, and identifying niche positions in the market. Some factors prove fundamental in determining who is a winner or a loser in this game: for instance, the accessibility of the destination; the quality and signicance of its primary resources (the heritage assets and other attractions) both in a physical and cultural sense; the friendliness of hospitality services, and the exoticism (true or perceived as such) of the experiences. Finally, the specic features of the urban dimension of tourism development need to be understood. It is an awkward question that has been poorly addressed in the literature. If one poignant theme has to be singled out, this may be the territorial unbalance between tourist productionsubstantially placeless given the global articulation of the industryand consumption, that remains constrained in a space of a few thousands of square metres in the historical areas of cities. It is not by chance then that accessibilityand consequently the

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System II System I
Primary tourist products Image Secondary tourist products

Local government - Organising capacity - Strategies

Tourist industry External accessibility of destination Internal accessibility of attractions - Tourist policy - Strategies

Attractiveness of the tourist system

Fig. 1. A model of the overall attractiveness of an urban destination. Source: Van den Berg et al., 1995.

spatial harmonisation of the various sub-systems of which the contemporary city consists ofis one of the key-issues for a sustainable tourist development.

3. The visitor-friendliness of cultural-tourist cities The challenge for cities that are destinations for cultural tourism is nding a balance between niche qualitiesthe identication of the unique points of the cultural supply, and their sophisticated communication to the publicand the industrial standards that are needed for the inclusion of the destination in the strategies of the great generators of international tourism. In this polarity, the city must nd an optimal point. A possible failure in the attempt of communicating or making accessible the various strengths of the heritage would result in a limited capacity to attract tourists. The factors that determine the competitiveness of a destination have been synthesised in the tourism product concept by Van den Berg, Van der Borg, and Van der Meer (1995). The structure of the model is shown in Fig. 1. The rst component is the quality of primary tourist products, that is, the elements that represent the main reasons for a visit to the locality; the second regards the quality of the secondary or complementary products. The third factor is represented by the image of the destination. The fourth and fth factors are

connected with the accessibility of the destination, articulated in external and internal accessibility. External accessibility can be dened as the effort required to reach the destination. The internal has to do with the ease of wandering around the destination and reaching the various attraction points during the stay. The quality of primary and secondary products, the image and accessibility can be improved through deliberate actions by the industry and the government. In practice, tourist strategies focus almost exclusively on single attractions and on external accessibility (Law, 1993; Van den Berg et al., 1995), while the internal accessibility and the other elements of competitiveness do not receive adequate attention. These ve factors have been made operational to permit an international comparative analysis.1 To achieve this, a number of qualitative indicators have been evaluated for each city. These are:
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Existence of a strategy for tourism management at the metropolitan level. This depends on the co-ordination of the actors variously involved in the production process of tourist experiences, and this rst of all requires some cohesion with respect to means and strategic goals.

1 Details of the EURICUR study on the visitor-friendliness of European cities can be otained from the authors at the addresses given in the heading. Alternatively, visit the web site of EURICUR, http:// www.euricur.nl.

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Quality of information and hospitality. The process of communication and interaction with the visitor already starts at the origin of the travel. Once the visitor reaches the destination, the time pattern typical of urban tourism assumes a crucial importance for the way the visitor obtains the necessary information. Presence and quality of secondary or complementary tourist services. Hotels, bars, restaurants, congress centres and exhibition halls have to be sufciently diversied to be attractive. Moreover, such facilities have to offer value for money, that is, quality levels that are consistent with their price. The internal and external accessibility depend on the quality of urban transport, but also on the structure and location of terminals, on the ticketing and information services, on the frequency and variety of travelling, etc. Attractions and events. To be attractive to visitors, the primary tourist goods demand a thorough planning effort that includes their promotion, commercialisation and interpretation. Moreover, they have to be available all during the year and at sufciently exible times to permit usage.

4. The case studies EURICUR researchers have visited the four sample cities for about one week, returning to two of them (Turin and Lyon) two years later. They personally tested public and private transport facilities, hotels, restaurants and bars; they have visited congress centres, museums, galleries, malls and all sorts of tourist attractions in the city and in its immediate surroundings. Other information provided by the cities has been utilised to reconstruct the context of tourist policy. The tourist competitiveness of the four cities has been subsequently assessed utilising the criteria exposed in the previous section. The four cities chosen to test the proposed conceptual scheme represent atypical tourist destinations, albeit for different reasons. Lisbon is certainly the most celebrated and visited of the four, but is extremely peripheral in character. The relatively recent advent of democracy in Portugal, and the consequent hardships in endowing itself with an adequate infrastructure, have delayed its tourist development. The Portuguese capital has been proposing itself as a major destination for international tourism for only a decade. In the last years, the need to close the gap with other great European capitals and to compensate for its location disadvantage have pushed the city towards modernisation and the symbolic and material exploitation of Portugal as a maritime nation. It is not by chance that this was the main leitmotif of EXPO 98, the mega-event that nally projected Lisbon on the international stage, with a

subsequent continuous and visible impact on its urban functions and forms. Rotterdam shares with Lisbon the link with oceans and navigationit hosts the biggest seaport in the worldthat makes it a real capital of multiculturalism; a bridge between Europe and the rest of the world. Apart from this, however, Rotterdam is straightforwardly modern. The Dutch city presents a dynamic image, due to a far-reaching urban policy with respect to social innovation, architecture and urban planning, resulting in an almost aggressive modernity that is its strongest trademark (Hitters, 2000). At the same time, the city possesses remarkably parochial traits, a consequence of its social conguration and of its very sparse, almost American, urban form. This enduring dualism has so far hampered a real take-off for tourism. Rotterdam has a very attractive landscape and more than a few assets to display to occasional visitors, but hardly communicates them, makes them fully accessible or sells them to a mass tourist market that continues to prefer Amsterdam. Turin may seem the antithesis of a tourism destination: the symbol-city of the Italian car industry, a city tied to its traditions of being the cradle of Italian Risorgimento. Yet, a visitor that decides to come to Turin attracted by its many cultural assets, would enjoy a positive tourist experience. The city administration has realised the importance of this potential, and has carried out a number of initiatives dealing with tourist supply and visitor services. The rst test, the Holy Year of 2000, produced for Turin (where the Holy Shroud is located) an increased ow of pilgrims. That challenge was easily met. Now Turin has sought a well-dened position in European cultural itineraries, and may prot from a proposed transalpine high-speed train link. The recent reorganisation of the city tourist ofce is thought to be a good starting base for creating more positive attitudes among residents and visitors. Last, Lyon boosts a precious but not universally known cultural heritage. In 1999, the old city centre including Roman, Medieval and 18th century elementswas declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO. This status is generally associated with a strong trend towards tourist valorisation. Also, Lyon, has other strong attributes: a healthy economy, that makes it a destination for business tourism; the excellence in wine and food, possibly the most celebrated in France; cultural institutions of major importance and a highquality public infrastructure. Clearly, problems are also present, such as a relatively poor ambience of restaurants, bars and social liveliness in the central business district, as well as a traditional incapacity to communicate to visitorsand especially to foreign travellers the many opportunities for recreation and cultural participation that do exist. Lyon seems resigned to its status of eternal second after the French capital.

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4.1. Strategies With the exception of Lisbon, these cities do not possess a consolidated tradition of tourist destinations. Only recently was tourism considered to be a priority in local development strategies, as a means to diversify an economic base. In fact, all the cases considered are cities with a history of industrial centres and/or ports, that have undergone some stages of structural crisis in their performance and status. Rotterdam is possibly the one most explicitly relying on tourism as a regeneration strategy. Lyon still has problems to dene a clear vision of its future as a tourist destination, despite the successful diversication and promotion of its culture in the light of its recently gained World Heritage Site status. Turin is just peeping at the initial stages of development as a destination for cultural tourism. 4.2. Information and hospitality With reference to visitor information, signicant faults have been found in each of the four cities in the rst round of visits organised by EURICUR. Clearly, neither Lisbon nor Rotterdam were paying sufcient heed to the quality of the informative materials supplied. Lyon managed to offer some interesting services to better cater for its visitors, such as the use of students to provide information by the most crowded terminals, or the placement of digital displays informing visitors and residents about the existing cultural opportunities. Moreover, visitors are offered free access to Internet by the tourist ofce; in this way they can build their own tailor-made itinerary. In Lisbon, the information system has worked at a reduced capacity in relation to the enormous quantity of existing tourist attractions, but a recent campaign for informing tourists in a more decentralised way through a network of kiosks was very successful. Moreover, the tourist ofce delivers, free of charge, an user-friendly, multilingual booklet signalling itineraries and attractions in a sympathetic but detailed way. 4.3. Secondary tourism products and services Hotel and restaurants in Lyon offer high levels of quality to support the high prices. Despite being inviting and convenient, local cuisines in Lisbon and Turin are poor in variety. Hotels in Rotterdam are pricey and the service in hotel and restaurants is often mediocre. There is an abundance of bars and other recreation outlets in the four cities, but in Rotterdamwhere the urban centre is rather sparsethey are not easy to nd. The infrastructure for congress and expositions is excellent in Lisbon (especially due to the investments for EXPO

98), in Lyon and in Turin, while Rotterdam lags behind. 4.4. Internal and external accessibility Public transport systems in the four cities are generally effective. Lyon has the best public transport network, but it suffers from an imperfect inter-modality and the links with the main terminals are not well organised. In Lisbon, the transport network is in many respects a tourist attraction in itself, picturesque, varied and relatively cheap; however, some improvements can be undertaken with respect to inter-modality. Rotterdam is late in its adoption of attractive and fast water transport, the only way to link the various elements of the tourist supply in the metropolitan region; moreover, the use of taxi is often awkward for foreign visitors. Finally, the city still waits for a new railway station (in will be ready in no o10 years), and for the associated reorganisation of a whole area of fundamental importance for visitors perceptions, the gateway to the city centre. Turin lacks a transport infrastructure of the status found in comparable metropolitan regions. Signposting in the Italian industrial capital city is confusing, and the links between different terminals are poor, even if on the occasion of the second visit of EURICUR personnel, some improvements were noticed in tourist transport. Turin, Lisbon and Rotterdam are the cities with a better accessibility to events and attractions. In the case of the Portuguese city this is a remarkable fact given the unfavourable features of the urban landscape. 4.5. Attractions and events Lisbon hosts numerous cultural attractions of international appeal, but also Turin scores well in this respect. Lyon and Rotterdam possibly lack a unique and easily recognisable selling point that attracts the tourists looking for some introductory sign of the citys supply (such as an Eiffel Tower or a London Tower), even if Lyon can now boost its etiquette of World Heritage Site. However, should the Dutch city nally decide to invest adequately in its major resources, that is the port and in general its waterfront development, it will possess a major tourist infrastructure of note. Moreover, the noteworthy investments borne by Rotterdam in culture and special events have been effective if compared with the recent achievements of Lyon, and generated substantial returns on its status as the European Cultural Capital of the year 2001. 4.6. Image and atmosphere Lisbon enjoys a very positive tourist imageprobably exceeding its objective meritsand has succeeded in

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laying the base to retain this advantage into the future, ! escaping the easy cliches of local folklore by investing in modern and multifunctional infrastructure. On the other hand, Lyons and Rotterdams tourist images are not positive. These cities are evaluated positively for their dynamism and quality of life that their residents enjoy, but cannot establish themselves in collective thinking as tourist places, even if some improvement may be expected from the designation of the former as World Heritage Site and of the second as Cultural Capital of Europe in 2001. Turins image is not different from that of many other industrial cities, despite its cultural riches and stunning traditions. None enjoys the atmosphere, the friendly climate that one feels in Lisbon, despite enduring efforts in promotion and investments. Crime in the four cities is not a particular problem. Visitors feel safer in Lyons and Turin, though recent (2001) much-publicised incidents of petty criminality may spoil their present clean image. Turin and Lyons offer a greater supply of green space. Waterfronts are important in all four cities, be it ocean, river, harbour or canals, made accessible and attractive to visitors, even if Rotterdam may use its abundance in this respect even better than it presently does. 4.7. Lessons from the case studies A number of relevant elements emerge from the analysis of the four case studies. The rst is that the soft parts of the primary and secondary tourist products and internal accessibility are indeed important preconditions for effective tourist development. This is true for Lisbon, a city which used to count on improvisation, but on the occasion of EXPO 98 was obliged to organise its hospitality function in a professional way; and for Lyon and Rotterdam, cities with a remarkable potential for tourism development, but hardly exploited because their internal accessibility is imperfectly organised. It also true in the case of Turin, still apparently undecided about its opportunities for development. The comparative analysis of visitor-friendliness in the four cities not only underscores the main deciencies in the quality of hospitality, but also permits an inventory of best practice. A tourist card distributed in Lisbon is an incentive for tourists to visit attractions that otherwise would hardly be included in their itinerary, with a signicant impact on the average duration of stays. The case of Lisbon also illustrates that a positive attitude by the population towards guests may compensate for faults in the organisation of the hospitality, however serious; and that these very faults may be easily corrected when a shared vision exists of the opportunities at hand for the city and of the way in which the potential is actualised through the organisation of high

quality tourist experiences. That information campaign convinced the residents of the advantages offered by EXPO 98 and is a sign of the city administration building a real consensus among local stakeholders on tourist development. Also Turin, in the recent years, has successfully completed a transition stage. Today, there is consensus about the necessity to change the approach of the city towards tourism, as the recent reorganisation of the tourism ofce proves. Religious tourism adds to the more traditional business visitor market, advancing the momentum to execute strategies of development in the cultural market. The opening of important museums and exposition centres (Lingotto, Rivoli) represent important rst steps. The decision to devote the recently restored Mole Antonelliana (possibly the only real architectural landmark of the city) as a Museum of Visual Arts and Cinema, as well as a new interest for industrial tourism products, are signs of a vision fully compliant with post-modernism. Today, it can be said that the charme and richness of the Italian city go together with a real predisposition to invest in tourism development, even if the scepticism of the host community towards tourism represents a barrier to tourism growth. Lyon can decide to follow a similar route, possibly exploiting the present good neighbours relationship with Turin. The approach adopted by Lyon towards tourism information has proved very interesting. From strategically located tourist kiosks, to the enormous variety of brochures, programs and totems, visitors are assisted 24 h a day. However, after two years the system needs improvements, while some steps back have been noted by EURICUR observers. All the cities are willing to inform visitors by utilising the Internet technology; the best results have been achieved by Lyon and Turin, while Lisbon and Rotterdam offer decidedly inferior standards. Following the example of Lyon the other cities can employ young personnel to assist incoming visitors. Lyon also serves as an example for the efforts of the Chamber of Commerce in the establishment of a tourist monitor, a system of computer-aided information management designed to support the responsible agencies in taking decisions regarding tourist development. Business visitors, a market segment that is particularly important for the great European cities, require fast and comfortable transfers. The effective design of the transport network and its efciency depend, among other things, on an optimal scale of territorial management, based on the metropolitan region or the province rather than the municipality. The principle that all matters of supra-local interest should be managed by an authority organised for the purpose is not only valid for transport, but for tourism management at large.

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Rotterdam, in trying to set up a metropolitan authoritywhich was never realised due to the opposition of its peripheral municipalitiesaimed to reorganise relationships between the tourist ofces throughout the region. The effectiveness in public-private cooperation in tourism development efforts is also illustrated in the case of Rotterdam by the Waterstad venture. This partnership managed to carry out a complex program of transformation of the inner port areas. Today, the same coalition is studying opportunities and obstacles to the implementation of information and communication technologies for urban governance. Waterstad represents an exemplar path for the other cities in this study, which are clearly decient in this respect.

sionalism, creativity and the capacity to astonish remain the most important elements. Therefore, we conclude by arguing that cities aspiring at becoming international destinations for cultural tourism should not neglect the quality of human capital and training, not only in the lower grades of the job market but also for tourist entrepreneurs and public and private managers. The availability of local higher education institutions that offer opportunities for continuing education in tourist management is a resource of fundamental strategic importance and remarkablyis not present in any of the cities included in this study.

Acknowledgements 5. Conclusions This study contributes a redenition of the hospitality function of a city, because it highlights its infrastructure and organisational preconditions. Far from arguing that culture exhausts itself in tourism consumption, it is suggested that if the conditions for a sustainable consumption of culture are not guaranteed, the enormous investments that in recent decades cities and regions are seeking for their cultural capital may be wasted. To have tourist potential, whatever the size, based on monuments, sights and attractions, is not sufcient for cities to establish themselves as tourist destinations. Attempts at promoting this potential without caring for other essential components of the hospitality function risks being useless or even counterproductive. Whenever the visitors owbadly managed and poorly assistedproduces recurring episodes of friction and distortion then such situation can be said to be unsustainable. To deal with these problems, European cities have to plan for their tourism development paying due attention to those intangible elements that decisively contribute to urban attractiveness. The various elements of the tourist productprimary and secondary products, events, transports, information centres and packing have to be systemised and managed according to an integrated and dynamic approach, for instance using the opportunities offered by new technologies. However, it should not be forgotten that tourism is above all a labour-intensive sector in which human touch, profesDr. Gianluca Rumi is acknowledged for participating in the elaboration of the synthetic framework of the visitor-friendliness and in the direct conduction of the case studies together with the authors.

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