Proposal of a Tourism Indicator System for Urban Destinations

Abstract

Considering the significant rise urban tourism is currently
experiencing and the impact this activity generates in such environments,
it is necessary to define sustainability indicators
that allow an efficient management of this activity. Within
this field, the objective of this research study is to create a
proposal for a system of sustainable tourism indicators for
urban destinations. This applied investigation, which uses a
methodology that combines both qualitative and quantitative
analysis, stems from the conceptualization of urban tourism
and ist sustainability and the implementation and quantification
of indicators. This initial analysis allows for the recognition
of the urban destinations’ sustainability dimensions and
for the variables with greater incidence in order to generate
a first list of indicators. This first theoretical list of indicators
is applied in four pilot cases (urban destinations of Catalonia:
Barcelona, Tarragona, Lleida and Girona), and results in a tested
system with four dimensions (socio-cultural, economic,
environmental and institutional) which collect 26 indicators.
The results show that the lack of information for the quantification
of indicators is one of the main limitations when it
comes to measuring tourism sustainability. For this reason,
the constant cooperation between public administration and
the private sector is essential for the generation of data that
allows the implementation of the sustainability indicators,
turning these into really useful tools in tourism planning and
management.