Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
not capture the sense of place…. To achieve this goal we need to move from cognitive
mapping to the “mapping of meaning” based on a humanistic approach, where the world
of experience to understand what the places mean to those people'. This is more
phenomenological in approach and has a strong synergy with ethnography (see Jackson
1985) and the early work of the Chicago School of urban research (Park et al. 1925;
Wirth 1938). What is clear for tourists in an urban setting is that human needs should be
met, particularly in terms of urban design including the innate need for security, clarity
(such as the need for being able to move easily and freely in what Lynch 1960 called a
legible
city), environments where social interaction can occur (e.g. public spaces and
places), conveniently located facilities and districts for visiting the urban leisure product
and an opportunity to gain a sense of place during the visit from a memorable and easily
assimilated urban form and structure. In the latter context, not only have urban
regeneration strategies for cities (see Page and Hall 2002) pursued physical regeneration
but also massive investment has gone into the re-imaging of places that hitherto have not
been high on tourists' consciousness as places to visit with a strong imagery and sense of
place even when one visits. This has become part of what Pacione (2005) describes as the
pursuit of the liveable city, so that planning and redesign of the city environment seeks to
accommodate a better living environment for residents and short-term visitors in pursuit
of gaining a better sense of place rather than becoming part of what have been described
in the UK as
Crap Towns: The 50 Worse Places to Live in the UK
(Jordison and Kieran
2003) which also have quite limited tourism potential. Many of the government strategies
within western countries seeking to improve the living environment as a basis for also
attracting tourism, a feature noted in post-event reports on hosting the Commonwealth
Games in Manchester, which improved the city's image and visitor numbers post-event.
However, in the context of developing countries such as Africa, Hoyle (2001) observed
the potential for urban redevelopment of water-front sites such as Lamu which may have
beneficial effects for tourism and urban conservation, but the juxtaposition of rich visitors
with poor local residents could have potential for conflict and crime.
INSIGHT: The value of urban heritage resources
Heritage does not just refer to old buildings. At its most basic, heritage represents the
things we want to keep. Nevertheless, as Glasson et al. (1995) described the situation:
Public definitions of heritage are still largely dominated by highly
educated professionals with expertise in fine art, architecture, engineering,
literature, music or design whose professional future is underpinned by
generating an academic, problem-based, literature on the subject. This
often places the professional at considerable remove from the visitor's
need.
(Glasson et al. 1995:20)
Tunbridge and Ashworth (1996) have identified five different aspects of the expanded
meaning of heritage:
• a synonym for any relict physical survival of the past
•theidea of individual and collective memories in terms of non physical aspects of the
