Why do we travel? Why do we visit places? For what reason? There are three main sectors of tourism: accommodation, transport and attractions. The last one sector is the answer for these three questions. We travel to see the beauty of our world, to see what people built hundreds of years ago few years ago, to experience the new culture, to experience adrenaline, to try new things, to check off another place on our travel bucket list and to post a photo on our Facebook or Instagram, to have a rest and inspire yourself.
Everyone is looking for something different. Some people like crowded places, some people like adrenaline, some people want to visit historic places, some people like to escape into mountains or places where is difficult to find anyone else, some people like to have long-distance trips to distant countries and some people like to gain new experience and get to know new cultures.
Whatever is your reason to travel you visit these places because you find it interesting, there is at least one attraction for you. It might be a Colosseum in Rome or Eiffel Tower in Paris, France; Niagara Falls in Ontario, Canada; Natural History Museum in London, Great Britain; Great Mosque of Mecca, Saudi Arabia; Aushwitz-Birkenau concentration camp in Oświęcim, Poland, Walt Disney World in Orlando, the United States; Eden Project in Cornwall, Great Britain. What these all places have in common? All these places are one of the main attractions in these cities or countries. You travel there because you want to see it. They are reasons why you want to visit this city or country.
What an attraction is? National Tourist Organization defines it as: “Where the main purpose is sightseeing. The attraction must be a permanent established excursion destination, a primary purpose of which is to allow access for entertainment, interest or education; rather than being primarily a retail outlet or a venue for sporting, theatrical or film performances. It must be open to the public, without prior booking, for published periods each year, and should be capable of attracting day visitors or tourists as well as local residents. In addition, the attraction must be a single business, under a single management, so that is capable of answering the economic question on revenue, employment” (VisitScotland 2008:4)
How do we classify tourist attractions? We can classify them on type, physical environment, ownership, perception, admission policy, appeal, size and capacity, composition, degree of performance, visitor numbers, organizational complexity and risk. Type – attractions can be historic houses, museums and galleries, castles, gardens, visitor centers, leisure parks, steam railways, country parks, wildlife attractions and zoos. Physical environment – it says in which environment attraction is located. It might be built environment, which is designed especially for a visitor purposes. The example of it are leisure parks. It might be built environment but wasn’t built in visitor purposed in the first place. The example of it are steam railways, castles, historic houses or workplaces. It might be a natural environment, for example mountains or forests. Ownership – it says who runs the place – it might be a trust, organization, individual, it might be also a private, non-for-profit or public sector. Perception – some places are clearly an attraction and are known as an attraction, but there are places like Aushwitz-Birkenau concentration camp that can’t be called an attraction, but people still visit this place. It’s a memorial for all people who died there, and a reminder of what people are capable to do. Admission policy – some places have a free entry, in some of them people have to buy tickets, some of them have a membership subscription, also places like churches and cathedrals request a voluntary donation. Appeal – some attractions are viewed at geographic level. Some are only for local market, regional, national or international. There are places such as farm parks that are visited only by local people, but places like castles or famous buildings such as Buckingham Palace are visited by local people but also by people all around the world. Size and capacity – some places are really big and are able to be visited by thousands of visitors, but some of them are tiny and aren’t able for it. It is important to manage place in the right way to protect its resource base so it won’t be destroyed by too big amount of visitors. Composition – many attractions have a nodal character – it means that they are located at or around well-known place like for example capital city – others have a linear character – they follow a route or line. Examples for linear attraction is the Great Ocean Road in Australia. Also, events might be nodal – they might take place in one place but they might take place in few locations like the Edinburgh Festival which take place across the city or FIFA World Cup. Example of a nodal attraction is the Eiffel Tower in Paris, France. It’s an icon of Paris but also the whole country. People visit Paris and on the top of their to do and see list is to visit the Eiffel Tower. Degree of performance – visitors attractions are building with a degree of performance. It means during the events or festivals building and a mobile infrastructure are used too. Visitor numbers – some places are visited by large numbers of visitors each year (even millions of people), but some of them are visited by small numbers of visitors. There is a general guide to classify attractions by a visitor numbers: small attraction is visited up to 50 000 times a year, medium attraction – 51 000-300 000 and a large attraction is vidited by over 300 000 people a year. Visitors number may increase because of special events for example tomato throwing event in Spain. Organizational complexity and risk – tourist attractions must be really good managed and need to be coordinate during events, because large numbers of people have to be under control.
Also, there are three other ways to compartmentalize attractions: natural or man-made attractions, nodal or linear, differentiation among “sites as locations, permanent attractions and special events”. (Page, S. J., Tourism Management: Managing For Change, p. 278) Natural attractions are national parks such as Snowdonia National Park in North Wales, viewpoints such as the Eiffel Tower in Paris and wildlife such as Grand Teton National Park in the United States. Man-made attractions are places like Tower of London or Colosseum. About nodal and linear attractions I mentioned in a previous paragraph. Location is just a capital city (or whole country in case of Vatican City State) such as London or Paris, permanent attraction is a House of Parliament or the Statue Liberty in New York City, the United States, special event for example is FIFA World Cup which takes place in various locations every four years (in 2014 it took place in Brazil, in this year it will take place in Russia).
There is numerous tourist attraction all around the world for tourists. Everyone can find something right for yourself. People can climb the mountains (even Mount Everest, but it’s not for amateurs), swim with dolphins or sharks, learn how to surf in Australia, swim in every ocean, fly a balloon in in Turkey, ride camels in Egypt, stroke the tiger in Thailand, visit battlefields, memorials and castles such as Mont-Saint Michel Abbey in France, travel to faraway places from their hometowns for example New Zealand for people from Europe, meditate in Tibet, get to know new cultures and experience new cuisine such as Indian culture and cuisine, visit world’s capitals to see icons such as Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro, visit places where films or cartoons where made for example Moominworld in Finland, travel by Orient Express in Russia from Moscow to Vladivostok or travel by the Route 66 in the United States, take a rest in all-inclusive resort or even travel into space.
These days travelling doesn’t have to cost a bomb and we can travel to everywhere. People can close their eyes and point a place on the map and then easily organize their trip to this place. People travel to get to know yourself, to meet new people, to learn languages and to make their dreams come true.