Understanding Residents' Attitudes toward the Development of Industrial Tourism in a Former Mining Community

Abstract

The topic of residents' attitudes toward tourism development has been analyzed by many authors, but there have been few studies that have included: (1) the impacts resulting from tourism perceived by residents of a particular region in a very early stage of tourism development, where, consequently, this industry is not yet economically important; (2) the relationship between the impacts of tourism perceived by residents and their degree of satisfaction with their community; and (3) a specific tourism segment, such as industrial tourism. The article presented here addresses these gaps in the literature, and focuses attention on the attitudes of the residents of Minas de Riotinto—a locality of the Spanish province of Huelva, traditionally involved in mining activity, which is now in decline and in the very initial phase of tourism development—toward greater development of tourism in their municipality, and on the factors that may determine and explain those attitudes.