50 management strategies
for (the new) cultural tourism
#gir180
December 2014
50 management strategies
for (the new) cultural tourism
creative commons
Source: Fundació La Ciutat Invisible
Fundació La Ciutat Invisible
The Fundació La Ciutat Invisible is the fruit of the intention of institutionalising the point of contact between the private sector and
public access to culture. It aims to become the crystalliser of all the energies revolving around the stage arts and culture in Girona,
paying special attention to the Temporada Alta Festival as its most prominent referent.
The Foundation is structured into three organisms: the Club CT, the Espai de Pensament and the Cercle CT.
gir180
GIR 180 graus is a series of seminars organised by the Fundació La Ciutat Invisible to reflect on the cultural
tourism of the future. #gir180 has welcomed 10 speakers in three sessions and some fifteen members of the Fila
3.0, who have contributed ideas, reflections, proposals and a new vision on (the new) cultural tourism in mediumsized cities.
The presentations can be watched on the gir180 YouTube channel.
You can also follow the online debate on the cultural tourism of the future.
This document, drawn up by the Fundació La Ciutat Invisible, gathers together the principal practical contributions,
which can be useful for public and private managers of cultural tourism.
Presentation
Joaquim Nadal
Fundació La Ciutat Invisible
Today there is a proliferation of debates on the tourism of the future, with a repetition of formulas and diagnoses and a search for new
paths to increase the quota of contribution of cultural tourism to the economy of cities. But little progress is being made in finding
solutions, and there is a growing risk of internal imbalances in the life of cities. It is very probable that all of this is the result of an error of
conception. The relevant factor is not tourism, it is the city. And in any case, if we advance in the sectorial debate, the theme is,
undoubtedly, tourism and the city.
In this relationship, the central question is equilibrium and compatibility. The social cohesion of the city is an indispensable element. Social
fracture impedes coexistence, and in a fractured society tourism can be a new factor of equilibrium or, on the contrary, a disruptive factor.
For this reason, all proposals which reject stereotypes and approach the soul of the city and its citizens take on great importance.
All of these reflections have been expressed in the seminars of Gir 180 graus. The idea of a radical turnaround has been noted and new
paths have been opened up: new paths which offer even more solidity in establishing diagnoses than in studying solutions. But we make
the search for solutions a firm commitment in order to construct new projects which, on the basis of critical innovation, profile a new
generation of tourist cities. The key to success is to be ready for the future. We hope we have begun to contribute to this goal, and we are
committed to continuing tirelessly along this path, thinking about the whole world from our city of Girona.
Reinforcing the non-tourism route
1
Tourist cities run the risk of being exceptionally tourism-minded, that is to say that the dynamism of tourism becomes so active that it
leaves no room for the rest of the city’s economic and social activities. When this happens we reach the situation of Venice, we arrive at
a city that is emptied of residents and filled with visitors. And this city is not even attractive for tourists, because it has lost its urban life,
the principal attraction of towns and cities.
An initial strategy, suggested by Paolo Russo, is the promotion of the non-tourist route. This commitment to elements not related with
tourism is a way of protecting the tourism activity. In Venice, the port and the University act as generators of citizens and residents who
live outside the sphere of tourism and can create a non-touristic dynamic. Paradoxically, the first strategy of tourist cities is to reinforce
everything that is not tourism.
Searching for longer-distance visitors
2
The studies of the city of Girona show that the average stay of day trippers increases with the distance from their place of origin. The
tourists who are staying on the Costa Brava spend less time in the city than those staying on the Costa de Barcelona; and those who
make the longest one-day visits are those who are staying on the Costa Daurada, in the south of Catalonia. The conclusion is that the
greater the distance between the place visited and the place of origin, the longer the visit.
This finding is of capital importance for the management of monumental cities, which have a percentage of visits from tourist
destinations. The priority is not to attract nearby visitors but to be capable of becoming an attractive city for more distant tourist
destinations. Distance generates time, and short distance generates speed.
Opening up to new markets
3
All the studies reveal a trend towards a growth in the number of tourists in the coming decades. We are on the threshold of a true
flourishing of tourism, with increasing numbers of visitors in all the destinations. In particular, there will be increases in long-distance
flows, journeys from new and sometimes unprecedented origins to new destinations. The tourism of the future will be accompanied by
a growing dispersion in travellers’ origins, needs and motivations, which will be ever more complex.
Opening up to new markets is a way of diversifying the classic markets, of diversifying the spaces of origin (and, therefore, reducing the
dependence on a small number of spaces) and of turning towards new segments. But this requires the collaboration of the higher-level
tourism organisations, a mid-term strategy and a capacity of adaptation to the new cultures. Explaining a city wall to a French person is
not the same as explaining it to a Peruvian or Indian visitor.
Changing the scale of management
4
Monumental cities operate on a much broader scale than their municipal limits. They are spaces that attract various types of flows, such
as proximity day-trippers, tourists staying in nearby tourist destinations, tourists staying in periurban spaces (which compete in price)
and tourists in transit. While fiscal policies (such as the taxe de séjour or the Catalan tourist stay tax) affect only tourists in
accommodation, and promotion or management policies are addressed to tourists themselves, the logic of tourism operates in a much
larger sphere.
There are several ways of overcoming, at least in part, this imbalance, which can be reduced to the idea of a new scale of management.
For example, a fiscal policy which taxes tourists’ consumptions, a policy of financial rebalance based on the uses of the city and not on
overnight stays, or a policy of urban management and flow dynamics on a regional scale. The Lanzarote Island Plan or the Territorial
Plan of Catalonia are two examples of planning at the regional scale, with compensation mechanisms.
Converting residents into tourists
5
Paolo Russo’s presentation on new urban landscapes in post-tourism shows that the frontiers between tourists and residents tend to
dissolve or become more fragile. In this context, some cities have set in motion programmes which open up tourist facilities to
residents. In Cartagena de Indias, in Colombia, the aim of the Cartagena Mía programme is to enable the city’s residents to access the
hotels of the tourist zone. The historical centre has been colonised with hotels and tourism establishments and has displaced the local
population towards new areas of the city. This has created a symbolic frontier that limits contacts between residents and tourists
beyond a merely commercial relationship. The Cartagena Mía programme enables residents of the more modest population groups to
come into contact with the reality of tourism, and to a large extent it promises to produce an effect of symbolic and effective
reappropriation of the urban space.
Adapting to the ageing of the population
6
The World Tourism Organisation (WTO) has identified demographic changes as the factor that will have the most significant impact on
tourism in the coming decades. Among these changes, the WTO detects modifications in family patterns, the consolidation of new
segments (such as single-parent families, single people or multiple families), the increase of urban population, the generalisation of
migrations (with the emergence of a “nomad” generation) and the ageing of the population.
Jaume Marin placed the emphasis on the collective of senior citizens. The lengthening of life expectancy generates a new demographic
pattern, that of elderly persons with an acceptable state of health, long experience of tourism and a predisposition to travel that is not
subject to employment constraints. In addition, this sector obliges cities to rethink themselves, acting on accessibility, the provision of
rest spaces, the treatment of the public space, and so on.
Creating singular events
7
The new generation of events responds to a process of “festivalisation” of the city. Francesc González says that events improve the
quality of the city, stimulate creativity and enhance the city’s image. One of the main attractions of events is their capacity to create
urban atmospheres of a festive nature. They also enable the city to move from an “inert” heritage, a space of contemplation, to a
heritage as a living space and the creation of a space for living. In tourism, events permit a transition from observation to
experimentation.
However, González warns of an inflation of events, a constant growth in the volume of supply in all the tourist cities. And this tendency
may generate a negative response on the part of the demand, especially if those events conform to repeated formats, to a
standardisation of supply. For this reason, the key strategy in the management of events in cultural cities is the search for singularity.
Linking events with the city project
8
One of the most habitual tendencies of contemporary cultural cities is the development of an ever broader catalogue of cultural events,
which move between innovation and repetition. Francesc González’s studies reveal the growing inflation of events and the great
dispersion of initiatives within the same city. González proposes that large-scale events be identified with the city project with the aim
of increasing the multiplying effects and the impact on the city’s image.
One example of this binomial is Salvador Sunyer’s proposal: the theatre city. Sunyer proposes that the theatre festival become the
motor of a city project, which will promote not only performance but also production, and will therefore convert Girona into a pole of
stage creation. He contemplates the concentration of companies linked with the theatre (lighting, stage sets, sound, image, dramaturgy,
etc.), but also with creativity. And he proposes that the stage arts be incorporated into the syllabuses of the city’s schools.
Committing to creative tourism
9
Creative tourism is a form of tourism that focuses on the participation of visitors in activities related with creativity. In creative tourism,
visitors abandon a passive attitude and become active agents who practise, learn, compare, experiment and, in a word, create. Types of
creative tourism are pictorial tourism (in which the tourists paint the tourist places they visit), culinary tourism (for learning techniques
and recipes) or photographic tourism (where tourists are guided by expert photographers).
Creative tourism has shown a notable growth in the last decade and has received the support of UNESCO, which created the creative
cities network in 2004. Creative Lena exhibits a number of initiatives of creative tourism. This tendency makes it possible to connect the
strategies of monumental and cultural cities with the new requirements of today’s tourists.
Creating spaces of transition
10
Cultural tourism always signifies passing from an everyday place to an extraordinary space. There is always a phase of transition which
makes it possible to move from the profane to the sacred space, to use N.H. Graburn’s anthropological terms. Between the two there
has to be an intermediate phase which will help us to prepare for what is exceptional.
Michelle Llona’s project in Machu Picchu pursues this goal. Traditionally, transport systems carried visitors to the gate of the
archaeological enclosure. But now this architect has brought the entrance down to the foot of the mountain. In the access route she has
created various information and contemplation points which help to create an atmosphere of initiation. Then a zigzag path follows an
ancient Inca trail, which lengthens the transition phase and helps to create a much more intensely lived experience. The creation of
these transition phases will be of vital importance in the contemporary design of cultural tourism spaces.
Creating more human urban brands
11
One of the great battles of contemporary cities is the conflict between brands. Brands do not constitute the way the city wants to be
seen but the way it is actually perceived: the compendium of sensations, values, ideas or symbols that we associate with a particular
place. And these brands are very relevant in the process of deciding where to spend our holidays, because we project on the destination
the values we perceive of it.
Tourist cities strive to improve, adapt, enlarge or reorganise their brand. Historically, these cities have sought an image centred on the
conventional tourist attractions. But now cities are progressively incorporating criteria of social responsibility into their brand strategy,
with values such as sustainability, equality, the struggle against discrimination and so on. At gir180, the representative of Stockholm said
that the city bases its urban brand on its condition of green city, with a decided policy of reduction of emissions and wastes.
Innovating in internal transport
12
The way visitors move around a cultural site can in itself become a tourist attraction, creating new and unprecedented perspectives,
radical changes in the way we relate to cultural objects. In historical cities, the elimination of traffic has permitted the incorporation of
new transport elements, like segways, with frankly unequal results.
The Castle of Sant Ferran of Figueres is a heritage building which is characterised by its large dimensions. It is an immense space which
traditionally has been visited on foot. One of the tourist products developed here has been the tour of the historical complex in a 4WD
vehicle, creating a new experience and facilitating a connection between the building and its surroundings. In addition, visitors cross the
large water deposits in a motorised boat, which again incorporates an innovative perspective of the space and an unusual experience.
Proposing new uses
13
Heritage sites have always been presented as places for visiting, for walking. The cultural logic we have inherited has created spaces
managed as corridors of culture where visitors only walk and look. But heritage sites are gradually beginning to incorporate new uses
that enable them to be reconsidered as public meeting places, tourist attractions or socialisation spaces. The renovation of the British
Museum planned by Norman Foster foresees the creation of an interior square acting as an urban agora.
In Vienna, the Dinner in the Museum programme offers the experience of visiting different museums of the city and having dinner
there, thus giving them new uses. The city’s great museums, like the MAK, the Albertina, the Natural History Museum or the Art History
Museum, offer this unprecedented opportunity. This creates a new way of seeing and living cultural sites.
Innovating in opening hours
14
The sociologist José María Iribas says that tourists do not consume spaces, they consume time. And tourism management has not
analysed with sufficient perspective the time dynamics of the tourist experience. Most heritage sites have the same opening hours,
which makes it impossible to visit a large number of places during a visit. Changing or lengthening the opening hours gives a place an
advantage over the rest, improving tourists’ opportunities of visiting it.
Innovating in opening hours also makes it possible to change the perspective, the vision, of the site. Dalí de Nit is a singular experience
that enables visitors to view the surrealist artist’s museum with in an atmosphere that is much more in tune with his work. Night is the
time of shadows, of dreams, of nightmares, of the other side of reality. Museum nights are an initiative that began in Berlin in 1997, and
it has amply demonstrated its viability.
Creating secondary tourist attractions
15
The study by Professor Núria Galí denounces the fast look that characterises tourism in monumental cities. The “fast look” is
characterised by three elements: (a) the ritual practices of tourists, (b) a very small number of nodes to visit (tourist attractions), and (c)
a very short average stay in those places. The result is a superficial experience that does not permit an appreciation of the plenitude of
each element. For cities, this practice limits the tourists’ economic - and social - interaction in the destination.
Among the measures for combating the fast look, Galí proposes transferring the intensity of promotion from the principal node (or
nodes) to secondary nodes. Since the entire tourism system is oriented to promoting a few key elements of the city, the most effective
measure is to invest the efforts of local promotion in less well-known elements. Secondary nodes can offer a new interpretation of the
city, increase the number of nodes and the average stay, and improve the visitors’ final evaluation of the place.
Opting for new-format events
16
In a scenario of inflation of events and repetition of models, Francesc González proposes strategies of singularity. As in all tourism
products, differentiation must refer to both the supply (the formats) and the demand (the publics). Creating events addressed to new
publics is a way of broadening the spectrum of possible visitors to monumental cities and linking cities with unconventional segments.
Girona’s Black Music Festival (BMF) is held in the city and the adjoining town of Salt. In 2014 it closed with 18,000 spectators, over 50%
more than the previous edition. At #gir180, its director, Jordi Planagumà, explained that the key of BMF’s success is the search for
unusual artists and groups who do not frequent the more commercial circuits, and the festival’s move out into the street. In the 2014
edition, the Festival opted to stage some of the performances outside the clubs and concert halls, a decision which paradoxically led to
an increase in admissions to the paying events.
Incorporating play
17
Play is an everyday activity of relationship, and not only among children. Play is an alternative way of presenting messages, tales or
stories that tend to be overlooked by the habitual criteria of narration. Geocaching, for example, is a game based on finding “treasures”
hidden by other players with the help of a GPS or another mobile device. It makes it possible to associate objects with their location and
create educational activities.
London’s Tate Modern has made a strong commitment to apps. By the end of 2014, its official website was publishing 24 apps, from the
most pedagogical to the most specialised. The application that has achieved the greatest degree of virality is one in which the
characters in the pictures fight each other in a battle of virtual cards. Tate Trumps is a game that can be followed from the gallery or
from any space and allows three types of activities: virtual battles between the Tate’s characters, virtual confrontations between the
gallery’s paintings or collecting the player’s favourite works.
Establishing bridges with creativity
18
Cultural cities are scenarios for displaying creativity and art, usually of past times. But cultural exhibition spaces can also be spaces of
creation and atmospheres that propitiate the development of innovation and creativity. The aim is to avoid a dead culture, a nostalgic
representation, and to take advantage of the creative continent to develop new proposals. The town of Sitges planned a series of “caus
ferrats,” spaces of creation revolving around activities like gastronomy, design or music, but in the end the project was not executed.
The New Museum of New York has created an incubator for artists in its adjoining building. The Museum offers spaces for new artists,
with the intention of creating a pole of concentration of talent and creativity. The project facilitates relations between artists and the
connection between their work and the cultural life of the city.
Encouraging visits by recurrent tourists
19
In the analysis of the “fast look,” two factors have been detected which notably lengthen the average stay and make it possible to
change the most ritualistic circuits of tourist consumption of the city: overnight stays and repetition. Tourists who stay in the city of
Girona have a much more solid, elaborate and complex relationship with the urban space than day trippers who make only a short visit
here.
The second group is that of recurrent tourists. Freed from the ritual of visiting the nodes imposed by mainstream tourism, these people
take an interest in other spaces, other scenarios and other urban areas. Their use of the city is both quantitatively and qualitatively very
different from that of the rest of the visitors. Consequently, the classic strategies of raising visitor fidelity are especially pertinent in the
management of monumental cities and the struggle against the fast look.
Events that improve spaces
20
The Renaissance Festivity is an event that has consolidated itself in the city of Tortosa and on the map of festivals of Catalonia. Turning
away from the model of medieval festivals, the success of Tortosa’s proposal lies in situating itself in a single period, with a powerful
emotional charge and universal values, namely the Renaissance. The Festivity, which commenced in 1996, has achieved a notable
degree of public participation. Above and beyond the direct effects and the projection of the image of the city, the Festivity has
enhanced the value of the heritage elements of the 16th century that had previously passed more or less unnoticed. The historical
recreation has revealed the need to protect, restore and revalue the elements of the heritage of that period.
In this same line, the “Indians” Fair of Begur, which recreates the atmosphere of this Costa Brava town in the times when former
emigrants returned with great wealth from Spain’s West Indian colonies, has activated a process of revaluation of the town’s material
and immaterial heritage related with that period. In this respect, the events also act as dynamising factors of the heritage.
Telling stories with ICTs
21
ICTs can be extremely useful for telling stories. This is the case, for example, of the Krakow Museum. A selection of its paintings were
related with stories about revenge, courage or love. Surrounded by a chroma and with characterised actors, the stories can be seen
alongside the paintings to which they refer, thanks to an augmented reality application. In this way, each painting is associated with a
story, which is represented by means of a mobile device. The strategy was accompanied by a clever advertising campaign in which the
characters sent text and Facebook messages.
In a similar line, the Igartubeiti Museum presents the various characters who inhabited the old caserío, the classic Basque rural house.
The various resources of light, sound and virtual representation, guided by a tablet, are applied during a visit of some 45 minutes. The
characters come to life during the visit, performing everyday activities and conveying their own particular cosmology.
Creating melting-pot spaces
22
In his presentation on urban landscapes in tourism, Paolo Russo identifies melting-pot spaces in his catalogue on new spatial practices
in contemporary cities. In contrast with tourism spaces, which tend to segregate tourists and residents, these new spaces are quite the
contrary: areas of confluence between mobile collectives (not necessarily tourists, and not necessarily residents). These spaces have an
extremely high symbolic value because they offer us indications of the capacity of the new urban spaces to create spaces of confluence
and not of segregation.
The first space is collective performance, like the Plaça dels Àngels in Barcelona, in front of the MACBA, which is a meeting space for
skaters. Carrer Hospital, in the Raval, is a zone of confluence of shops addressed to very diverse publics, run by owners from a wide
variety of origins. The Barceloneta beach is also a meeting space for people, in one of the scenarios in which we are all probably most
equal. Finally, the spaces of convergence between cultural tribes. These scenarios demonstrate that it is possible to create melting-pot
spaces and enrich the city with the coming together of groups of different origins.
Personalising the offer of experiences
23
Today we consume in a radically different manner from only 20 years ago. Our challenge today, Xevi Montoya says, is that of emotion, of
generating interactions that have an impact - because the emotions are the true entrance door to knowledge. The most probable future
tendency is that these experiences will be personalised. In the same way that Internet search engines learn from our everyday decisions
and orient their responses according to our behaviour, the future tendency will be the personalisation of experiences.
Mobile devices map our use of space, the time we spend at the various points and our reaction to the different stimuli. This will make it
possible to offer different experiences to different users and to adapt in an iterative manner the characteristics of the supply to the
behaviour of the demand.
Creating events to reinforce nodes
24
Eudald Tomassa, the head of Transversal, believes that events have to be at the service of the permanent offer. They have to be the
element that makes it possible to wrest importance from tourist attractions. He illustrates this strategy with two examples: Món Sant
Benet and La Pedrera.
Món Sant Benet is un element of tourism dynamisation of an area that was weak in tourism terms. With the collaboration of the
Fundació Alícia, the Alicia’t programme is an event based on the values of the Foundation, which aims to revalue the node of reference,
the Món Sant Benet. Another event is the Temps de les Ànimes. The second example is La Pedrera: Transversal conceived a strategy for
renewing the offer, extending the opening hours and creating an evocative ambience. The result is Pedrera Secreta.
Adapting to the new generation: the
millennials
25
Jaume Marin‘s presentation warns of the need to adapt to a new generation, that of the so-called millennials. This name refers to the
generation that came of age around the change of millennium. They are characterised by having the highest percentage of university
graduates of all time, because they have lived through the technological revolution, because they have a very different logic from the
preceding ones and because they have a very high level of tolerance. They consume to define themselves, but they display little
materialistic mentality. They have many more relational aptitudes and a very acute critical sense.
Adaptation to these millennials requires, among other strategies, a greater incorporation of ICTs into product processes, the
incorporation of ethical values, greater sophistication and constant interaction with the demand in order to adapt to its changing needs.
Incorporating near field communication
26
Near field communication (NFC) is a short-range, high-frequency technology that permits an exchange of data between devices. Xevi
Montoya identifies it as one of the most significant technological changes for tourism in the coming years. The most frequently cited
use of NFC is payment by smartphone or any mobile device. In heritage cities, NFC can radically change the management of information
on the city and its elements.
In the city of Barcelona, 8,000 items of information have been generated related with QR codes and NFC technology. This enables
visitors to access the information provided by each element by placing their mobile phones close to the NFC device. In contrast with
mobile phone applications, NFC provides textual or audiovisual information on an element when the visitor requests it, without the
need for an Internet connection.
Creating new perspectives
27
Opening up rooftops, entering the storerooms of museums, going down into the basements, discovering bell towers... The management
of heritage elements has taken too long to break the angles of perspective and suggest new ways of looking at nodes. Creating a new
angle is, in a certain manner, a way of presenting a new node and at the same time breaking the ritualised view of the place.
The Abierto por obras (Open for Works) project is an initiative of the Cathedral of Vitoria. The rehabilitation process of the Cathedral
necessitated constructing a scaffolding system to be able to work in the highest parts of the building. That structure gave rise to a very
innovative programme which invited visitors and residents to view the Cathedral from a different perspective, and the number of visits
to the Cathedral multiplied by ten. The programme has a second, indirect effect: it creates a closer relationship between the local
population and the public investment in the heritage.
Evaluating proposals of collaborative tourism
28
In The Age of Access, Jeremy Rifkin already proposed a change of paradigm in the transition from ownership to access: rather than
owning an asset or a service, what the new users demand is access. Combined with the generalisation of the social networks, this
process has led to the appearance of new collaborative forms, in which various users share an asset or service. It also permits the
emergence of P2P (person-to-person) relationships in which people exchange knowledge, experiences, tips, practices...
Although the best-known applications are Uber and Airbnb, the universe of collaborative tourism is beginning to integrate all the
spheres of the tourism system. Couchsurfing enables a user to spend a night in the home of a host; HomeExchange offers exchanges of
residences; Sherpandipity connects tourists with local guides; EatWith offers a culinary experience in a house in the destination being
visited... Collaborative tourism permits new forms of relationship between individuals, and it will be one of the great transformations of
the model of tourism in the coming years. Monumental cities will have to modify the way they address these new visitors and to take
advantage of the opportunities provided by P2P.
Commercialising
29
The legislative framework and long tradition have limited the capacity of destinations to commercialise their cultural products. This has
often made it difficult for those products to connect with the demand and has restricted the possibilities of creating new initiatives. In
the present legal framework, destinations have to create travel agencies or associate themselves with existing agencies. The
municipality that opened up a new path in this respect was Santiago de Compostela. Xerardo Estévez, the mayor of the city for 15 years,
spoke at the #gir180 meetings.
The Catalunya Turisme agency has set in motion a web portal for the sale of tourist experiences that opens the doors to a new form of
commercialisation of tourism products within the portal of the umbrella brand of “Catalunya.” catalunya.com offers tourism products
organised into thematic fields, one of which is “art and culture.”
Activating solidarity tourism
30
Zully Salázar explains the experiences of solidarity tourism in Cartagena de Indias. In a city with high poverty rates and strong spatial and
social segregation between tourists and residents, these innovative forms of tourism allow new relationships to open up. Per example,
the cooperative tourism programme integrated 15 traditional fishermen of the mangrove-swamp zone into the tourism circuits. This
made it possible to create new products such as routes, fishing tours and a programme called mangrove therapy. Cartagena’s tourism
strategy is to apply its know-how and its capacity of connection in the tourism sphere with popular wisdom handed down from
generation to generation. The experience in the mangrove swamps offers Cartagena’s visitors the opportunity to connect with a new
cultural and geographical reality and activates an opportunity of exploitation by social classes removed from the large tourist circuits.
Banking on open data
31
Opening up public data. This is a growing demand of various citizens’ movements, for inventories of tourism resources, data on
demand, georeferenced information, cartography or cultural data to be in free standard formats. Some destinations have already
presented the first proposals in this respect. The city of Barcelona offers all the cultural information on the city in open format. Toronto
has also opened up a substantial catalogue of data relating tourism and culture. But the city that offers the greatest number of
resources in open form is probably the city of New York.
In the first place, opening up data is an exercise of transparency. But it also represents a chance to create opportunities and initiatives,
based on the creative use of information. The hybrid spaces that allow for cultural data to be connected with various other spheres will
be the birthplaces in the future of the principal experiments in cultural tourism. and these innovations will only be possible in a context
of open data.
Connecting emotions with understanding
32
Jordi Padró is the head of STOA, a company that has been dedicated for many years to museography and cultural projects. Its most
recent actions include the Sala de Fabricas of the Cathedral of Pamplona, and the project “Abbot Oliva, founder of Europe.” Padrò’s
interventions centre on the need to transmit emotions and feelings, to generate impacts that leave a mark. Neuroscience has
demonstrated that the emotions are the gateway to understanding, and that knowledge requires experiences, experiences based on
feelings and emotions.
The information offered is often accurate but not useful, because it is not capable of connecting with universal emotions, with feelings
that activate curiosity and memories. Padró proposes to reorganise the information of the destinations and their elements around a
new element, that of the emotions. In this respect, the tourism portal of the USA proposes a catalogue of experiences that stir the
emotions. The Basque Country also organises its tourism programme on the basis of more or less innovative experiences.
Promoting basic training in art
33
Still today in the collective European mind, Italy and France are seen as privileged places for living high-quality cultural experiences. The
European programmes have accentuated this vision, since a substantial part of the resources related with cultural tourism have been
addressed to these two countries. For Professor Dolors Vidal, the textbooks have an enormous influence. In the studies that have been
conducted, France and Italy occupy a very significant part of the narration of the history of art in Europe.
Vidal’s proposal is to give greater value to studies in art. To promote knowledge of and research into the heritage. To broaden
knowledge of our past. And above all, to place emphasis on the educational sphere. Increasing the quantity and quality of basic training
in art is a necessary requirement in a process of tourist revaluation of the country’s heritage.
Adapting to the long queue
34
The concept of “long queue” is the term that has been generalised of Pareto queues, arising out of an article by Chris Anderson on
business models like Amazon. Broadly speaking, the long queue considers that the sum total of the products that have little audience
tends to exceed those with large audiences. Although most companies tend to compete for mass-consumption products, a very
significant part of the potential demand lies outside of this sphere. Recent studies on tourism appear to show a progressive substitution
of the demand for standardised offers by singular products adapted to smaller demand groups.
Adapting to the long queue involves, in the first place, the ability to connect with very precise and very singular demand requirements.
In the second place it involves a strategy of diversification of products, because the small number of potential users is not sufficient.
One example of adaptation to the long queue was described by Paolo Russo, who studied the visit to air-raid shelters, where local
people act as guides on the basis of their own experiences.
Reducing tourist signs
35
Some tourists have looked at themselves in the mirror and don’t like what they’ve seen. Tourism (or at least a part of it) is living a crisis
of identity. This has given rise to movements in the social media addressed to tourists who don’t want to be tourists. Trourist, Spotted
by locals or Not For Tourists are websites that capture this urge to break with the touristic ritual. But it is possible that these tourists will
create a new ritual, because tourism (even tourism that doesn’t want to be) tends to create repetitive social patterns.
These tourists are especially averse to tourist signs, that is, those signs that confer on a place the condition of tourist site: signposting,
tourist trains, the accumulation of accommodation supply, tourist shops and establishments ... Some destinations have begun to reduce
this symbology, to symbolically “detouristify” themselves, with the intention of being more attractive to this generation of tourists.
Opening up the tourist outlook to new
scenarios
36
Traditionally, tourist rituals seem to follow the classic distinction made by McCannell between “front” and “back.” In the “front,” tourists
enter a space where the only residents present are those who have a commercial relationship with the visitors. This “front” makes it
possible to preserve the “back” outside of the voyeuristic look of the tourists. The reality is much more complex than this dichotomy,
and McCannell himself offers a much broader catalogue of situations between the two extremes.
Cities have begun to display their rear courtyards to tourists. They have moved from presenting a small fragment of the urban space
(usually the historical centre) to showing a much wider geography that integrates the social, cultural and geographical diversity of its
neighbourhoods. The 10 Barcelonas programme is an attempt to decongest the city centre (the “front”), but also to open up the
tourists’ outlook to new scenarios, some of them completely outside the tourist routes. New York is also striving to overcome the
tourist concentration in Manhattan, with the presentation of the five boroughs that compose the city.
Creating an ambassadors programme
37
The ambassadors of a destination are well-known people who have been born and lived there, and who can perform the role of
prescribers of the place. This is the most recognised concept of “tourism ambassador,” and the one that has been used in the Lleida
tourism programme. The initiative confers credentials on those persons who meet the requirements laid down by the locality. The aim
is to create a network of prescribers who help to promote the city.
In the USA and other Anglo-Saxon countries, the ambassadors are local people who act as hosts for visitors when they reach their
destination. An American network lists these ambassadors, who are certified in accordance with a set of specific criteria. In Sweden, the
Visit a Swede programme connects local hosts and visitors on the basis of their interests and affinities. The portal offers collaborative
tourism practices, such as couchsurfing.
Integrating the present into the cultural offer
38
Traditionally, cultural cities (especially monumental cities) have associated culture and the past. Most, if not all, of their monumental
cultural offer centres on the vestiges of the past, that is, their heritage. In cultural cities, the present, today’s world, is not present. Cities
have gradually begun to integrate their contemporary offer into their tourism catalogues. This is the case, for example, of Barcelona’s
Design Tour, a guide to the city’s most important design establishments. In Barcelona, tourists can also visit the city’s contemporary
architecture route.
Integrating the present into the city’s cultural offer avoids the association of these cities with museum scenarios, places trapped in time.
It also helps to integrate touristic elements with the city’s cultural and artistic life, because it favours the connection between
production and consumption.
Transforming models of governance
39
Passion for Palma is an attempt to change the image of a city, a powerful branding operation that seeks to replace the positioning of
Palma as a sun-and-sand destination with Palma as an urban tourism destination. The principal agent of this operation is the Passion for
Palma Foundation, directed by Pedro Homar. The Foundation is formed by two public organisations (the City Council and Ports de
Balears), plus AENA and 28 private firms. Each private company contributes 20,000 euros annually, either in funds or in products and
services. Why do they do this? In the first place, out of a commitment to the city; in the second place, for the social acknowledgement
they achieve; and finally, for the resulting tax deductions.
This has made it possible to modify the model of economic contribution of events that are clearly addressed to the tourist public and
financed 100% by private capital. The local administration only intervenes in logistics and public management.
Amplifying the voices of the destination
40
If cities could talk we would hear many different voices: male, female, old, young, nostalgic, optimistic ... But when cities speak about
themselves they always use the same register, the same voice. The diversity of the destination is usually trapped by a neutral vision of
the space, a voice that fails to connect with the plural universe of the visitors. The initiative of the curators of contents is an antidote
(one of the possible antidotes) against this uniformity.
The first example of this has been Sweden. The country’s official “voice” on Twitter is adopted every week by a Swedish person with the
programme Curators of Sweden. This makes it possible, in the first place, to move from the impersonal tone of institutional profiles to
the proximity and empathy of real people with real problems and dreams. It also allows for a continual modification of the voice of the
country, which constantly changes register.
“Demonumentalisng” the monumental city
41
In her proposal of strategies to combat the “fast look,” Núria Galí concludes with a neologism: demonumentalising. This concept does
not have to be understood in the sense of removing the monumental aura of the city’s historical buildings. It means quite the contrary:
integrating into the tourist circuits those elements, those nodes, that have traditionally been considered to lie outside the tourism offer.
The everyday spaces of the city, like its markets, parks, squares and commercial areas, can complement the city’s classic offer and
present themselves as the contemporary version of the old city. Without a doubt, the success of this strategy lies in the capacity of
connecting the historical city with the new city, not only physically but also symbolically.
Following the tourists’ trail
42
Tourists leave a constant trail. Every time they walk into an establishment, enter a museum, buy a ticket or book a table at a restaurant,
they are manifesting a behaviour pattern. But we need these partial and opaque pieces of information to begin to be open and
connected, always preserving the visitors’ anonymity. Meanwhile, Núria Galí’s methodological proposal displays the quantity of
information that is obtained from monitoring tourist visits with the support of GPS; more than half a million data items gathered in one
year. Mobile devices and drones will soon complement this information.
There is one track in particular that tourists constantly leave: their use of social networks. Tourists take photos and make comments that
share and criticise items of the city, and these manifestations are easy to trace and systematise. Some tools make it possible, for
example, to monitor the tweets they make about a city, in accordance with preset criteria (language, location, keywords, etc.). We can
also follow the tourists’ photographic trail. The sightmap application lists the most photographed elements of each city; Coralí Cunyat,
Girona’s Councillor for Tourism, revealed that the city is one of the 15 most photographed destinations in the world.
Combining reality and projection
43
Virtual reality does not have enough power to dissuade tourists from travelling: nothing compares to the sensation of being in a place,
of being there. Augmented reality, on the other hand, does offer a very interesting field of action, because it combines reality and
projection. What is projected? The range is very extensive: information, images, videos, texts, interactive elements... The London Street
Museum is a good example of the capacity of augmented reality to enhance the heritage. This application makes it possible to project
on a particular perspective a historical image that corresponds exactly to the scenario we are seeing; in this way, the visitor can
contemplate at the same time the London of today and its graphic history.
In Catalonia, the mapping of the Pantocràtor of Sant Climent de Taüll makes it possible to see at the same time the “deep” Pantocràtor,
the marks the artist left to fix the composition, and the projection of the Pantocràtor itself, which is conserved in the MNAC. It also
allows a story to be told, creating a memorable instant and lengthening the visitors’ average stay in the church, which Núria Galí’s study
revealed was previously very short.
Integrating all the senses
44
Urry says that the tourist experience has traditionally been a visual experience. Monumental cities have abused this sublimation of the
look, which has been multiplied with the generalisation of photography. We look at cities, and all the touristic organisation is based on
the principle of the contemplation of places. Can we combat the pre-eminence of this sense, the sense of sight?
It is difficult to offer urban elements that go beyond the visual sense. However, today we know that the sense of smell has a greater
evocative capacity and is much more memorable. The recreation of everyday Rome that was presented within the framework of the
Tarraco Viva Festival in Tarragona gave a special treatment to the smells of the city, from the urinals to the aroma of fruits or wheat.
While smells are best treated in closed spaces, the use of the sense of hearing can also be stimulated in open spaces. The recovery of
bells in some medieval cities or the recreation of conversations and ambiental sounds in heritage spaces create much more vividly lived
atmospheres. The sense of touch reveals properties of materials that mere sight cannot appreciate; for this reason, some museums
have replaced “Do not touch” signs with “Please touch,” stimulating tactile connection with the elements exhibited.
Connecting with everyday life
45
Can everyday landscapes be integrated into tourism practices? Intuitively, we ought to say no. Tourism, by definition, is an extraordinary activity, outside of the ordinary. We travel precisely outside of our habitual environment in search of new experiences that go
beyond the frontier of our day-to-day existence. In his journey around the urban landscapes of post-tourism, Russo proposes examples
in which the everyday has come to form part of the tourism channels.
Ravalejar is an expression that means “living the Raval district.” This Barcelona initiative, carried out by very diverse mobile collectives,
involves creating a space of relationships that is not based on the touristic principle of exceptionality. Another example cited by Russo is
a market in London where products and sellers of very diverse ethnic origins converge. The third example is “protest tourism,” that is,
travelling to another city to participate in a political demonstration. These everyday landscapes help us overcome the classic frontier
between the ordinary space and the tourism space.
Stimulating the landscapes of experience
46
In his atlas of urban patterns of post-tourism, Russo identifies the landscape of experience, in which the different collectives (tourists or
others) create a new relationship that replaces primary leisure. In this landscape of experience, the focus shifts from what is tangible,
the material culture, to the intangible, the immaterial. One of these ways of weaving new relationships in the space are the human
towers or “castles,” which the Costa Daurada Tourism Board promotes as an activity of integration between local people and tourists;
the towers allow visitors to form part of the human mass that raises the tower. A second example is the organisation of cookery
workshops, which permit an exchange of knowledge on local cooking techniques and also the creation of a space of exchange and
relationship in the family ambience of the home.
The landscapes of experience make it possible to break with the classic conception of tourist leisure activities and open the door to new
manifestations of relationships between individuals, based on the transmission of values, knowledge, looks, and in particular the
creation of experiences based on immaterial culture.
Souvenirs with art
47
Souvenirs have long been a kitsch phenomenon, a banal expression of bad taste. In 2009, the Barcelona Design Museum dissected the
culture of the souvenir in a splendid exhibition, Souvenir Effect. The exhibition displayed the contradictions of the souvenir and its
culture. In his presentation, Joan Maria Viader proposes that travel souvenirs be based on the artisanal tradition of the region and take
advantage of the traditional arts, such as the pottery of La Bisbal.
Within the framework of the Future Factory of Barcelona, Mohamed El Amrani contemplates a circuit of connections between local
artists and tourists which permit the circulation of souvenirs with art.
Converting the city into the centre of the
destination
48
Many monumental cities (as is the case of Girona) are visited by tourists from nearby destinations. Several presentations of #gir180
proposed changing this logic and recovering the centrality of cities. Historically, cities have been the centre of their hinterland, the point
of reference of the surrounding territory. Monumental cities can attain greater growth if they are capable of establishing themselves as
logistical centres for visits to that territory – if Girona, as Salvador Sunyer proposes, becomes the city of the Costa Brava and the
Empordà.
In Mallorca, also, the strategy of repositioning the brand is based on situating the city of Palma as the centre of reference of a
geographical brand that reaches all the island, as is explained by the head of Passion for Palma, Pedro Homar.
Converting tourists into the voice of the
destination
49
Australia is probably the tourist destination that has best adapted to the logic of tourism 2.0. In fact, since 2012 Australia has been the
number one destination in Facebook, Google+ and Instagram. The key to its success is the capacity to transfer power to the consumer:
95% of the contents shared on Australia’s web portal are provided by the visitors themselves. This entails transforming the logic of the
portal and adapting it to the various social networks. In this respect, the portal is a point of connection between very diverse networks,
integrated between themselves. The strategy is also based on an emphasis on small stories, on the visitors’ personal experiences.
In a context in which publicity has lost credibility and the classic promotional channels are becoming increasingly sterile, the reputation
of a destination depends more and more on the information shared by tourists among themselves. For this reason, cultural cities should
create promotional platforms based on the exchange of information (positive, but also negative) about themselves.
Opening the debate on the future strategy
50
Museum of the Future is the initiative of the British Museum oriented to exploiting collaborative intelligence. By way of various
channels, the programme stimulates active participation by any person in the definition of the Museum’s future strategic lines, a kind of
strategic plan 2.0. The mechanisms of participation include the organisation of presential debates (which can be followed via streaming)
on key aspects of the future of the Museum, participation in various conventional surveys or online debates with the hashtag
#MuseumOfTheFuture. This is not only an exercise of transparency and new governance: it is also an opportunity to attract talent and
good ideas.
Monumental cities can also create active participation campaigns on their strategic possibilities.