Tourism – is it “killing neighbourhoods”?

By Heather Cameron Today is World Tourism Day (WTD), the aim of which is “to foster awareness among the international community of the importance of tourism and its social, cultural, political and economic value.”  (United Nations) Commencing on 27 September 1980, WTD is celebrated each year with fitting events based on themes selected by the […]

Smarter tourism: solving the data problem to boost tourism and create better cities

By Steven McGinty On 22 March, I attended ‘Smarter Tourism: Shaping Glasgow’s Data Plan’, an event held as part of DataFest 2017, a week-long festival of data innovation with events hosted across Scotland. Daniel MacIntyre, from Glasgow City Marketing Bureau (the city’s official marketing organisation), opened the event by highlighting Glasgow’s ambitious target of increasing […]

The rising price of checking in: is there a case for visitor taxes, or will business fund tourism development?

Tourism has a big impact on the UK economy. Figures from the World Travel and Tourism Council show that: The total contribution of travel and tourism to UK GDP was £187.7bn in 2014, and is forecast to rise to £263.9bn in 2025 In 2014 travel and tourism directly supported 5.7% of total UK employment Visitor […]

Does tourism pay? Assessing the evidence

by Brelda Baum It is estimated that tourism has the potential to generate $2 trillion globally by 2020 – as the economic situation improves and the ‘Great Recession’ is deemed all but over, let’s take a look at the evidence of the economic value of tourism to the UK and its regions. The Deloitte and […]

Promoting a high training culture in tourism

by Brelda Baum Training and skills remain perennial issues for the tourism industry.  Therefore, the recent call by UK Skills Minister, Matthew Hancock at a Work Foundation conference on skills, held on 3rd March 2014, for a move from a low to a high ‘training culture’ resonates with the European Commission’s proposal to establish a […]

‘Culture towns’: how small towns are leading the way

There has been no shortage of headlines sounding the death knell for our town centres over recent years as they continue to suffer from the effects of growth in online shopping, government policy and now the pandemic. But while concerns over the future of town centres is nothing new, neither are the changes that town […]

Revisiting the blue economy – a vital part of the world’s environment

This is the third in a series of republished blog posts from The Knowledge Exchange, revisiting important topics with ongoing relevance for public policy and practice, as well as for communities and wider society. This post covers the blue economy, focusing on why it is so important, the current challenges and what is being done […]

Are ‘dark stores’ bringing some much needed light to the high street?

As we pass the first anniversary of the initial lockdown and look towards opening things up again, will we see a change in footfall trends in favour of the high street as people yearn to get out again, or will it continue to experience a downward trend? Judging by pre-pandemic trends, it would seem that […]

Cross-border handshakes: what’s next for digital contact tracing?

As we enter a new year, and a new phase of the Covid-19 pandemic, we are reminded of the need to follow public health advice to stop the spread of the virus. The emergence of new variants of Covid-19, which appear to be more transmissible, has resulted in tougher restrictions across the world. Although the […]

Guest post: How working from home could revitalise rust belt cities

Michel Serafinelli, University of Essex For years, we have been promised a work-from-home revolution, and it seems that the pandemic has finally brought it to pass. In April this year, at the height of the first wave of coronavirus, 47% of people in the UK were working from home, the vast majority of them doing […]