Seventeenth International Conference on Environmental, Cultural, Economic & Social Sustainability

Abstract

In the 1980s when consumption of cultural goods became easier, traveling was brought within the reach of many. This process facilitated successful maintenance, interpretation, and safeguarding of heritage. Historic preservation changed its character by focusing on destination revitalization, job creation, cultural stewardship, housing, tourism, etc. With the accessibility of destinations cultural, historic, and human quality to heritage has become more vulnerable. For many traveling destinations, tourism growth has challenged places to meet sustainability goals and minimize negative effects on the environment. In many cases, adverse impacts on host communities, on their lifestyle and longstanding traditions have been unavoidable. Cultural influence has been expressed in the overuse of heritage sites and outspend of its capacity. Europe, where cultural tourism has predominantly occurred in historic cities, has been massively influenced by the progress of the travel industry. The gradual transformation of urban areas strongly altered the sense of place and caused the loss of human scale. Assessing the data of urban features and the economic aspects of the tourism industry provides an opportunity to conduct a cost-benefit analysis. Using economic and cultural valuation methods to identify the urban heritage value transformation and interrelation, the research aims to create a model that will be able to suggest how economic and socio-cultural values of heritage are influenced by mass tourism. Having found a parity pattern and the factor value of the two variables, the future, more sustainable scenarios of tourism management can be proposed in a historic city context.