Analyzing Urban Tourism in Cambridge: Resident Perspective

This report explores the impact of urban tourism on the residents of Cambridge, UK. It begins by defining urban tourism and examining the demand and supply relationships within the context of urban environments. The research delves into current debates surrounding urban tourism, including its effects on environmental quality and population density, and identifies Cambridge as a tourist-historic city. The methodology employed involves a deductive research approach and primary data collection to gather resident perspectives. Findings discuss the benefits and drawbacks of tourism, such as economic opportunities versus increased congestion and pollution. The study aims to provide insights for sustainable tourism management in Cambridge, balancing the needs of tourists and the well-being of local residents. Desklib provides access to this report and other resources for students.

Urban tourism
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Table of Contents
1 Introduction.............................................................................................................................3
1.1 Background......................................................................................................................3
1.2 Aim...................................................................................................................................3
1.3 Objective..........................................................................................................................3
1.4 Research Questions:.........................................................................................................4
1.5 Case Study........................................................................................................................4
2. Literature review....................................................................................................................5
2.1 Definition of urban tourism..............................................................................................5
2.2 The demand and supply relationships of urban tourism..................................................5
2.3 Current debates.................................................................................................................6
2.4 City type that Cambridge fits in (tourist-historic city) and related features of tourism in
this type of city.......................................................................................................................6
3 Methodology...........................................................................................................................8
3.2 Research approach...........................................................................................................8
3.3 Research method..............................................................................................................8
4 Results and discussion.......................................................................................................10
4.1 FINDINGS.....................................................................................................................10
Chapter 5 Discussion................................................................................................................10
4.2 DISCUSSION................................................................................................................15
5. Conclusion............................................................................................................................26
6 References.............................................................................................................................27
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1 Introduction
The urbanization is a process in which the population moves from the rural to the urban area.
In the current world, the population and economical growth of the urban area is growing side
by side. The urban cities have achieved a better social mileage, political and economical
progress in comparison with the rural areas. The urbanization gives birth to the
industrialization, commercialization, employment, modernization to benefit the society. In
this context, the urban tourism is the term, which describes the multiple tourist activities in
which a city is the main tourist destination. The urban destination offers a heterogeneous
range of architectural, technological, social, cultural and natural experiences to the tourist. In
a word, the dynamic development of the unban tourism is the source of employment and
business growth.
1.1 Background
The city of Cambridge is situated beside the River Cam, which is the evidence of human
settlement since the Bronze Age (Preston, 2011). The city is an inland port, which provides
the access to the North Sea and the Continent via the River Cam, Wash and Ouse. The
Roman settlement is the main reason to make the city a historic one. Several excavations
enrich the historical essence of the city in order to make Cambridge one of the most eminent
historical cities of England. Nowadays, Cambridge becomes a perfect blend of old and new
culture to attract the international tourist. However, the residents of the city are facing several
positive and negative effect of this tourism. The increasing number of visitors is flourishing
the economical condition of the city. On the other hand, the increasing number of tourist is
decreasing the hygienic level of the surroundings. Therefore, the massive gathering of the
tourist is causing several obstacles in the lifestyle of the residents of Cambridge city.
1.2 Aim
The aim of the research project is to find out the pros and cons of Urban Tourism in
Cambridge from the perspective of the resident.
1.3 Objective
The main objectives of the research project are –
 To investigate the possible impact of urban tourism in Cambridge city
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 To identify the impact of tourism in the Cambridge city from the point of view of the
local resident
 To analyze the perspective of the residents of Cambridge city and draw suitable
conclusion
1.4 Research Questions:
The research questions are helpful to establish the research project.
 What are the possible impacts of urban tourism in Cambridge city?
 What are the impacts of urban tourism on Cambridge city from the perspective of the
residents?
 What are the viewpoints of the residents towards the growing tourism in the city?
1.5 Case Study
The city of Cambridge is full of historical places, which is the main reason to grab the
attention of the global and domestic tourist. The Cambridge courtroom, Castle Mound,
School of Pythagoras, King’s College chapel are the famous tourist spot. The urban tourism
of Cambridge is growing rapidly. At present, Cambridge is the most populated city, which is
overcrowded with the tourist. This rapid growth of the urban tourism has opened several
opportunities for the local residents. The increasing rate of employment and revenue are
rejuvenating the economy of the country. The local business growth enriches the living of the
residents. On the other hand, the massive gathering of the tourist is generating the suffocated
environment for the residents. They are facing congestion and pollution due to the increasing
number of tourists. The research project is to discuss the impact of urban tourism of the
residents of Cambridge.
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2. Literature review
2.1 Definition of urban tourism
The urban tourism mingles the values, cultures, experiences and expectation of the tourist and
the residents. At the early stage of nineteenth century, the term ‘urban tourism’ comes into
the content of research field. According to the viewpoint of Spirou (2011), the urban cities
are the blending of multiple communities and cultures besides the strong economic condition.
The urban tourism encompasses the industry, which markets and manages multiple products
and experiences to the people who have a wide range of preferences, motivations and cultural
perspectives in order to involve them in a single chain. From the view point of González
(2011), the primary elements of the urban tourism are leisure setting, socio-cultural features,
amusements, sports facilities, and the secondary elements are the local and international
business related to this industry. The users of this urban tourism services are the tourist and
the local residents. On the other hand, the historical places of the urban city are the resources.
In this context, the holidaymakers, local visitors, residents, and city worker are the linkage
between these service users and the resources of urban tourism. The urban tourism
interconnects the city with the tourism sector. The global tourism closely entangled with the
trajectories of urbanization and urban transformation.
2.2 The demand and supply relationships of urban tourism
The actual demand of the urban tourism depends on the psychological, political, geographic,
and economic factor of the locality. The renowned scholar Gössling et al. (2012) commented
that the demand of the urban tourism includes the planned demand, a lot of expenditure,
intangibility of the purchase, elasticity of the price, seasonality of the destination. The
components of the urban tourism supply comprise infrastructure, attractions, superstructure,
marketing, and promotion of the destined site. The infrastructure refers to the
telecommunication, transport and accommodation of the destination. On the other hand,
George and Booyens, (2014) stated that the museums, natural parks and other historical
places are the major components of supply chain. The marketing and promotion of the
destination is the link between the demand generating origin and the supply-receiving
tourists. The demand of the urban tourism depends on the perception of the tourist
destination, which puts them to plan a visit in the destination. The digitalization is facilitating
the future tourist to gain the knowledge about the destination with the help of feedback and
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sharing of the experiences of the past visitors. The media plays the vital role to determine the
demand and supply chain of the urban tourism. With the help of branding, the marketers
generate the positive image of the tourist destination in order to increase the potentiality of
the tourist. In this context, the government of the country takes some initiatives to create the
positive image of the tourist destinations towards the international tourist.
2.3 Current debates
Currently, the city tourism is the most important topic, which arising the debates about the
environmental quality and population density. The understanding of the urban tourism and its
progress becomes the integrated debate in the current tourism. The popular critics Ashworth
and Page (2011) stated that the challenges of the urban tourism are to rethink the models,
assumptions and frameworks of the prevailing arena of the social essence. In this context, the
urban tourism is significant to the sustainable growth of current economy and the
development of the systematic structure of understanding. The main reason of this
remarkable gathering of tourist in the city is the multifunctional facility of the urban tourism.
The renowned researcher Füller and Michel (2014) commented that the theoretical
understanding of urban tourism is now becomes an irony. The critical debate has taken place
on the extent that the well-established quantum of urban tourism analysis is there to assist the
understanding and development of the modern society. The multidisciplinary nature of urban
tourism remains weakly connected with the conceptual and theoretical perspective. However,
Mowforth and Munt (2015) stated that the worldwide cities are functioning as the gateway to
the national tourism system, enhancing the urban tourism of several destinations. The
competition among the urban tourist destinations is the most challenging threat to cut down
the revenue of the national urban tourism of the particular country. Therefore, the interlinked
among the urban destinations have the potentiality to generate the progressive revenue of the
country.
2.4 City type that Cambridge fits in (tourist-historic city) and related features of
tourism in this type of city
The urban tourism cities comprise different types of cities. The resort city of urban tourism
refers to the place where the tourist visits for the entertainment purpose. Ashworth (2013)
stated that the leisurely pursuits like shopping, recreation and other enjoyments are available
in this type of resort city. Generally, the resort city grows around the highly dense area in
order to gain the profit. On the other hand, the post-industrial city is newly added to the urban
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tourism sector. This type of city is full of industrial heritage and the major portion of the
tourist belongs to the business sector. The tour operators use this post-industrial city as the
best effective place for the marketing and promotion of their organization. Glasgow is
awarded in 1999 as the ‘UK city of Architecture’. Therefore, the world city of urban tourism
is to incorporate all type of tourist city. The world cities are enriched with the multi-
functionality, rich infrastructure, which are enough to grab the attention of the urban tourist.
The last one is the tourist historic city, which is the best representative of the historical
culture of the country. Cohen-Hattab (2013) commented that the historic cities are small in
nature and compacted with small buildings and narrow streets. The heritage building and the
organic atmosphere are the major attraction of the tourist historic cities. The city of
Cambridge is the famous historic city for tourists in the UK. The city possesses the unique
and ancient architecture, which is to present the historical essence of the city. The Audley
End House & Gardens, Cambridge American Cemetery, Ely Cathedral, The Fitzwilliam
Museum are the major evidence of the heritage and culture of ancient period. The existence
of historical aspects is enough to depict the city of Cambridge as the historic city.
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3 Methodology
3.1 Introduction
This study is to attain the sustainable plan to increase the arrival of the urban tourists in the
Cambridge city of United Kingdom. The methodology is to identify the areas of the research
paper, where the improvement is required. However, this study delves in studying the impact
of the residents to cater the excessive influx of the international tourist in the city of
Cambridge. Moreover, the methodology involved the primary data collections method, in
order to gather the reaction of the resident of this urban tourism in the city. Thus, the study
aims to obtain the unbiased output about the perception of resident people regarding the
impact of urban tourism.
3.2 Research approach
The determination of the research approach is vital to understand the data collection and data
analysis method. The research approach comprises two different sections such as inductive
research approach and deductive data approach (Ruiz-Ballesteros, 2011). The inductive data
approach is generally associated with the qualitative research using the research questions to
narrow the scope of the study. The inductive research approach is concerned with the new
theory based data to understand the individual robustness, emergence, and dynamics toward
the topic. On the other hand, the deductive research approach refers to the pre-specified
outcome, based on the quantitative research process in order to obtain the disseminate
findings. The deductive research approach is suitable to conduct this research study.
However, the deductive research approach provides the possibility to link the concept and the
variables of the impact of the residents to establish the scope for the generalize research
findings. This approach reduces the risk factor to get the biased report on the topic.
3.3 Research method
The data collection method is the core part of the research methodology. The primary data
collection method is the gathering of a set of data from the first hand sources like interview,
direct observation, survey and questionnaires. On the other hand, the secondary data
collection method gathers the data from the existing written documents. In this research
study, the primary data collection method is the suited one to gather the appropriate
information about the positive and negative impact of the growing urban tourism in the city
of Cambridge (Williams, 2011). The primary data collection method is consisting of
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observation; interview over telephone or face to face, questionnaires and others. The primary
data collection method may conduct with qualitative and quantitative data research process.
3.4 Data analysis techniques
The data analysis technique is to analyze the collected data in order to obtain the research
finding. Qualitative data analysis technique aims to address ‘why’ and ‘how’ of the topic in
an open-ended manner (Buckley, 2012). On the other hand, the quantitative data analysis
technique aims to address the ‘what’ content of the program. The quantitative data analysis
technique is used to gather the necessary information from the residents of the city of
Cambridge. However, this data analysis technique is a systematic approach to employ the
survey (Santana-Gallego et al., 2011). The quantitative data collection method focuses on the
residents’ perception over the increase in the influx of tourist and collected data over ten
responses of the complete survey.
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4 Results and discussion
4.1 FINDINGS
1. Specify your gender
Options Responses Total responses Percentage
Female 4 10 40
Male 6 10 60
Others 2 10 20
2. To which age group do you belong?
Options Responses Total responses Percentage
20-30 6 10 60
31-41 8 10 80
above 42 9 10 90
3. What according to you are the impacts of the urban tourism in Cambridge?
Options Responses Total responses Percentage
Reduced
unemployment
8 10 80
Growth of the cottage
and the ancillary
industry
6 10 60
Adverse impacts on
the environment
7 10 70
Impacts on the 6 10 60
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originality of the
place
4. Do you think that the culture and the society of Cambridge are greatly affected by these?
Options Responses Total responses Percentage
yes 9 10 90
no 3 10 30
may be 4 10 40
5. Are you satisfied with the positive impacts of the urban tourism existing in your place?
Options Responses Total responses Percentage
Highly satisfied 7 10 70
Satisfied 8 10 80
Neutral 4 10 40
Dis satisfied 3 10 30
Highly dissatisfied 1 10 10
6. According to you what are the factors that have contributed towards the overall
development of urban tourism of the place?
Options Responses Total responses Percentage
historic monuments 9 10 90
scenic beauty 8 10 80
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effective
infrastructure
6 10 60
good lodging
facilities
7 10 70
7. How far do you agree that Urban tourism has positive impacts on the local business of
the historical city of Cambridge?
Options Responses Total responses Percentage
Highly agree 8 10 80
agree 9 10 90
Neutral 6 10 60
disagree 3 10 30
Highly Disagree 2 10 20
8. How far do you agree that the increasing demand of urban tourism has created job
opportunity for the residents of Cambridge?
Options Responses Total responses Percentage
Highly agree 8 10 80
agree 8 10 80
Neutral 5 10 50
disagree 1 10 10
Highly Disagree 1 10 10
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