Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
• To determine levels of
sustainable tourism development
given the fuzziness of the
concept
GIS can be used to monitor and control tourism
activities once levels of development deemed
appropriate and acceptable by stakeholders have
been determined. By integrating tourism,
environmental, socio-cultural and economic data
GIS facilitates the identification and monitoring of
indicators of sustainable development
Lack of
ability
• To manage and control
development—associated with
uses, capabilities, capacities
GIS can be used to identify suitable locations for
tourism development, identify zones of
conflict/complementarity
Lack of
appreciation
• That tourism is an industry and
causes impacts which cannot be
easily reversed
GIS can be used to
stimulate
and
model
spatial
outcomes of proposed developments. To sensitise
stakeholders to externalities associated with their
actions, e.g. visibility analysis, network analysis,
gravity models
• That tourism is dynamic and
causes change as well as
responding to change, i.e.
tourism is just a part of a wider
development process which can
produce intra- and inter-industry
conflict which may destroy the
tourism resource
GIS enables the
integration
of datasets
representing socio-economic development and
environmental capital within a given spatial
setting. GIS sits comfortably on top of integrated
and strategic spatial planning
Lack of
agreement
• Over levels of appropriate
development, control and
direction
GIS functions as a decision support system—to
produce more informed arguments and (hopefully)
facilitate compromise and resolution. However,
this presupposes the existence of a coherent
planning and development control framework
Source:
Bahaire and Elliott-White (1999:162)
makers (see Page et al. 1999 for a discussion of this issue in relation to Maori tourism in
New Zealand). For example, in the case of Scotland's first national park, the Loch
Lomond and Trossachs National Park, it has embraced the use of GIS as a tool to help
develop the planning framework for identifying the zoning and management of visitor
areas and destinations as a basis for the development of spatial policies and actions to
manage visitor activity. This highlights how a range of geographical skills are being
harnessed to shape public policy through a partnership of public sector and university
researchers to provide a series of outcomes which are in the wider public interest. While
critics of such applied research might suggest that this is both theoretically devoid and
imbued with the values of the agencies concerned, university input was selected for its
impartial perspective and also due to the understanding of the complex theoretical and
methodological issues associated with developing such a framework. Indeed without that
geographical training, knowledge of theory and practice, then such inputs to the planning
and policy forming process could not occur. The role of theory and synthesis in the
management of tourism and recreation phenomena in a spatial context is critical in
informing the way forward, based on best practice and robust methodological
development to model the situation so that the wider public and policy-makers can
understand some of the spatial dynamics of visitor activity and impacts within the new
