La Trobe University: THS3DMM Destination Competitiveness Report - NYC

This report provides an in-depth analysis of New York City's destination competitiveness, focusing on two key elements: safety and security, and crisis management. The analysis applies the Ritchie and Crouch model, evaluating NYC's performance in these areas. The report examines the impact of various crises, including the 9/11 attacks, health-related issues, and economic fluctuations, on tourism. It also assesses safety and security measures, including crime rates, subway safety, and tourist perceptions. The report suggests strategies for improving destination competitiveness, such as promoting environmental sustainability, enhancing security provisions, and addressing poverty and social issues. It concludes by emphasizing the importance of these factors for NYC's tourism revenue and overall appeal. The report also provides recommendations to policymakers to improve safety for tourists.

Destination marketing
Destination
Marketing –
New York City
Student name
Student ID
Name of Tutor
University name

Destination marketing
Introduction
The destination that has been chosen here is New York City. The reason for choosing this
destination is because New York is one of the important cities of United States of America and is
famously known for Statue of Liberty (a symbol of freedom) and was known for WTC twin
towers. The mapping of the destination competiveness model with New York City can be done
more effectively, looking at the elements that have been chosen from Ritchie and Crouch model.
Competitiveness elements
We have chosen Safety & Security and Crisis Management from the model as they relate
effectively with the chosen destination.
Analysis
Crisis Management: Crisis Management is one of the important factors for any tourism
destination. In order to attract more tourists, it is evident that there should be a strong crisis
management in place, in case of any adversaries.
The tourism crisis could be placed under five
categories namely Environmental, Societal, Health related, Economic and technological
(Ritchie & Crouch, 2010)
.
The city of New York is one of the most important cities of United States of America. New York
is well known for its symbol of freedom, the statue of liberty. It was also known for the Twin
towers of World trade center (Yeye, 2011). The New York City has been experiencing a huge
Crisis and impact on tourism post the 9/11 attacks on World Trade Center, where hundreds of
passengers on the hijacked planes lost their lives. However, they have recovered quite well and

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we could rank crisis management as 3rd most important element after cost and safety / security in
terms of overall impact on the New York’s destination competitiveness (sbb.gov.tr, 2017).
From an environmental crisis perspective, the New York City has been experiencing ill effects of
rising temperatures and poor air quality that has affected tourism in the long run. As part of
Crisis management, New York has planned to launch a progressive policy to combat the climate
crisis and they plan to produce 100% electricity from only renewable sources by the end of 2040.
This would reduce greenhouse emissions by 85% in the next three decades. In order to influence
tourists and improve destination competitiveness, New York City can join hands with other US
states to reduce the greenhouse gas emissions and suggest Trump administration to retain their
membership under Paris climate agreement. This would attract more customers, especially
environment friendly tourists (Bekiempis, 2019).
From a societal and political perspective, New York faced biggest terrorist attack on World trade
center in 2001, where thousands of people were killed. Many flights were cancelled and tourism
industry suffered huge losses of reduced airline passengers. Hotel industry also suffered almost
up to 50% losses in revenue and this was an acute level of crisis. However, New York has been
able to attract tourists back to NYC by promoting enhanced security provisions and biometric
passport scan and facial recognition systems installed at the airports to prevent any
misadventures. Also, New York faces biggest problem of poverty. In New York, almost 20% of
the people live below poverty line. Another 36% people face a lot of hardships. Due to this, the
crime rate, racial conflicts and drug addiction have been on the rise. In order to reduce the impact

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on tourism and remain as a competitive destination, they have started promoting medication and
rehabilitation centers to reduce drug addiction. However, they have not been successful too much
on these lines. In order to influence tourists and improve competitiveness, New York City
tourism operators can organize sponsored events to spread awareness about helping the poor
people. Donations through social media could help in arranging mid day meals for children of
poor families. New York City can create employment opportunities for the poor and this would
reduce poverty and crime rate (Anon., n.d.).
From a health perspective, New York City faced health related issues from Legionnaires' disease
and measles, which has a widespread effect on tourism. In order to influence tourists and
improve competitiveness in such a crisis, the tourism industry along with NYC Health
department should deploy crisis management methods ensured that hygiene is maintained and
streets are kept clean. Vaccinations should be encouraged for all individuals to ensure end to the
outbreak and improving health conditions of the city should be promoted with NYC packages for
tourists via travel aggregator websites (Blasio, 2019).
From a technological perspective, USA is very strong and they have started deploying intelligent
transportation systems and autonomous cars / electric buses for tourism industry; they also have
AR/VR experiences for tourists in luxury hotels. Road safety has been of utmost importance to
NYC and they have deployed ‘Vision Zero’ plan to improve street safety and promote tourism.
In order to influence tourists and improve competitiveness, programs like ‘Vision Zero’ should
be promoted by tourism industry operators on social media which talk about safety on NYC
streets; tourists like to move on bikes and cycles during their tours.

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Lastly, from economic crisis perspective, NYC and USA in general are facing lot of currency
fluctuations due to US-China Trade war. The global slowdown is affecting the tourism industry
as fewer travelers would prefer travelling long distances for vacations; thereby inducing losses
for Travel and tourism operators. In order to influence the tourists to visit NYC, the tourism
industry of USA should create crisis focused strategic plans to promote higher frequency of low-
cost airlines and low budget hotels within NYC to keep up with destination competiveness and
this attracts more tourists towards NYC.
Safety and security
The safety and security can be ranked as 2nd most important element after cost in terms of
overall impact for New York City' s destination competitiveness. The need for safety is one of
the most essential aspect of one’s life after food and shelter based on Maslow’s hierarchy level.
New York City has largest population in the United states of America. Among the most known
places to visit in NYC, statue of liberty, central park and museum are key locations which attract
approx. 50 million tourists every year. It has been considered as one of the most visited cities of
the country. The report aims to assess NYC on destination competitiveness model; from safety
and security practices (schweb, 2017),

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The city is an international Centre for culture and arts, fashion, music, business and finance; and
its skyscrapers skyline, numerous landmarks and museums attracts many visitors. The latest safe
city report published by the economist states that New York city is considered as one of the
safest cities in the world. In fact, NYC is ahead from Paris, Rome, Washington D.C. in the list of
top 25 safest cities. However, theft around statue of liberty is not uncommon (Anon., 2019).
The research says that crime rate in NYC is depleting since last 10 years. Post 2011 attacks the
security has been tight and stringent, NYC is keep getting safer and secure day by day. The
tourists are provided with protection by police and under the protection of the city’s vigilant
security force. Furthermore, tourists do not visit the places where crime rate is high such as
Harlem, the Bronx, or other boroughs. They are rather advised to visit, statue of liberty, central
park, museum etc which has lower crime rate (Sargsyan, 2017).
Everybody is more concerned about subway travelling and its security in NYC. It has been
observed that subway crime is decreasing too; earlier the data was 17000 cases per year, now it
has come down to 2000 cases per year. It is one of the cheapest public transportation in New
York. Moreover, more than 4 million citizens are using subway every day, hence wondering
around in subway while visiting New York is safe now. Serious and violent crime such as
murder and robbery are not frequent now, it has been rarely seeing outside the city (Brent, 2018).
Overall, we can learn that New York is considered as one of the safest, but it is never bad to have
a local watching your back. This states that one should take precaution while roaming around
with alone. The review of visitors says that take care of your phone and wallet while travelling in

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subway. It is recommended that policy makers should develop safety measures for the people
visiting New York. The perception is not so good with respect to theft culture at New York. It is
important to keep one security guard on each department of subway so that people can
immediately connect with them in case of theft (mobile or purse). It was observed that night
journey at New York is difficult. It is essential to know the tactics to deal with local people who
may stop you at night if the car is vacant. It is recommended to employ cop in each corner and
keep CCTV cameras active at night. The night vision camera will gradually replace the need to
everyday cop. But to ensure security at places where tourists might visit and roam around, it is
essential to have team of security guard to safeguard the tourists. Because approx. 30% revenue
comes from tourism (N.A, 2019). One more thing is that one should be given list of points to be
taken care of while travelling to New York with emergency contact details. Furthermore, one
application should be designed to take care of concerns only related to tourism. This application
will have list of concerns and related security office contact details. One separate team can be
designated to solve the queries shared by tourists. Once the security aspect will be taken care of,
the place will be best place to live and visit (González-Rivera, 2018).
Conclusion
The report talks about two key elements of destination competitiveness namely safety & security
and crisis management. Tourism is one of the important sources of revenue for NYC and hence,
it is necessary to keep up with requirements of incoming tourists. NYC needs to promote health,
road safety, and environmental safety for tourists; along with marketing low cost hotels and LCC
(low-cost carriers).

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References
Anon., 2019. Is New York City Safe? Warnings and Dangers Travelers Need to Know. [Online]
Available at: https://www.smartertravel.com/tips-new-york-city-warnings-dangers-stay-safe/
[Accessed 10 October 2019].
Anon., n.d. September 11, 2001 Attack on America: A Record of the Immediate Impacts and
Reactions in the USA Travel and Tourism Industry. Toirism manahement, 23(6), pp. 537-580.
Bekiempis, V., 2019. New york to pass most agreesive climate crisis plan. [Online]
Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/jun/19/new-york-climate-crisis-
emergency-plan-progressive
[Accessed 9 october 2918].
Blasio, D., 2019. NYC declares end to measles outbreak that sickened hundreds. [Online]
Available at: https://www.healio.com/infectious-disease/vaccine-preventable-diseases/news/
online/%7Bf6389912-ddb8-4950-b3c5-af63243f1669%7D/nyc-declares-end-to-measles-
outbreak-that-sickened-hundreds
[Accessed 9 October 2019].
Brent, R., 2018. the detail of model competitivenss, s.l.: Proquest .
González-Rivera, C., 2018. Destination new york, s.l.: s.n.
N.A, 2019. Is New York City Safe to Visit in 2019?, s.l.: Viohero.com.

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Ritchie, B. & Crouch, G. I., 2010. A model of destination competitiveness/ sustainability
Brazilian perspectives. rap — Rio de Janeiro, 44(5), pp. :1049-66,.
Sargsyan, A., 2017. Variety of Approaches in Assessment of Global Competitiveness. ,
Armenian State University of Economics, 6(6).
sbb.gov.tr, 2017. Risk and Crisis Management in Tourism Sector: Recovery From Crisis in the
OIC Member Countries, Turkey: COMCEC COORDINATION OFFICE.
schweb, K., 2017. The global comptetitiveness report, s.l.: world economic forum.
Yeye, L., 2011. The competitive destination: A sustainable tourism perspective, s.l.: s.n.