Challenging Hit-and-Run Tourism in Cultural Heritage Sites

Cultural Heritage sites facing Hit-and-Run Tourism need to elaborate targeted strategies in order to balance tourism and heritage conservation, to define limits or find solutions in order to protect natural and cultural heritage and to mitigate negative impacts. In a paper by Engelbert Ruoss and Loredana Alfarè of the Global Regions Initiative, nine heritage sites in South East Europe are studied, including typical Hit-and-Run destinations such as Venice (I), Dubrovnik (HR), Hallstatt (A) and Aquileia (I), allowing four different types of Hit-and-Run sites to be distinguished. Continue reading

Americans, Get to Know World Heritage

“UNESCO World Heritage site” is one of the best-known labels in the world—a tourist magnet—except in the United States. Many Americans know nothing of the worldwide program they helped found 40 years ago, nor that the U.S. has 21 World Heritage sites itself. (Update: See post on the Dec. 3, 2012 Congressional briefing about World Heritage at NatGeo NewsWatch.)

Montana’s Glacier National Park, a World Heritage site. (Photo: Jonathan Tourtellot)

Working with the U.S. Park Service, which administers the domestic program, the UNESCO World Heritage Center now touts a new “passport” booklet intended to help Americans get to know their own internationally recognized gems, ranging from Yosemite and Yellowstone to Taos Publo and Independence Hall. Continue reading

So How Many Jobs Does Travel Create?

The U.S. Travel Association released on 26 August 2012 some data you can use to make a case for taking better care of special places: the number of jobs generated by travel and tourism. USTA is an advocacy organization, so these numbers may suffer from a promotional puff-factor, but even at half strength they would be striking.

 

Copyright © U.S. Travel Association

The report, Travel_Means_Jobs-USTA2012, offers a powerful argument for promoting tourism, especially overseas tourism. And that in turn provides an argument for good destination stewardship. Continue reading

New Challenge for Grand Canyon

A new Arizona Republic report summarizes the various development pressures affecting the Grand Canyon. While much of the canyon remains a magnificent wilderness, even those areas can suffer from noise and light pollution. Now plans for an extensive resort development in the gateway town of Tusayan threaten the canyon water table, as detailed by the New York Times. The development would threaten the Grand Canyon’s last rating, which had risen to an encouraging 66 in the 2009 NG Traveler stewardship survey. The danger is akin to other cases of excessive, unplanned hotel development damaging water tables elsewhere in the world, with consequences. In Siem Reap, Thailand, the overtapped water table endangers the foundations of Angkor temples. In the porous limestone of the “Maya Riviera” in Quintana Roo, Mexico, development has reportedly polluted the water table linked to the famed cenotes. All three areas involve World Heritage sites.