The urban tourist
Chapter 3
The urban tourist
Inserting the tourist into the cityscape
It’s impossible to imagine Liverpool without music, or music without Liverpool.
(Liverpool and the City Region Visitor Guide ‘09)
There’s no place in the world like Sydney.
(The Official Guide, Sydney, 2009)
The place to be … Burnley Town Centre.
(Tourist Map)
You Can Ride Your Skateboards and Bikes … But Not Through the City Centre.
(Gosford, New South Wales, Safe City Poster)
Tourism and cities
While many tourists speak of visiting a ‘country’, in reality of course they usually enter that country through a major city and often stay for lengthy periods in that city. The notion of the global city has also given rise to the city as the destination. Thus many tourists visit cities with this status, such as London, Paris or New York. In such cases it is probable that few of those visitors actually travel across many other parts of the United Kingdom, France or the United States. In part this reflects the urban nature of modern society. Museums, theatre, shopping and sporting events tend to be located in cities and so there seems a natural fit between the city and the tourist. There will always be tourists who wish to stray ‘off the beaten path’ but there will be many more who enjoy the delights of the urban landscape exclusively.
What this has given rise to is the potential for the city to be recast as a ‘product’ that can be marketed to tourists. As John Hannigan describes it, this involves a process – largely begun in the 1980s and 1990s – of ‘theming’ the city where various activities converge:
In the theme park cities of the 1990s, shopping, fantasy and fun have further bonded in a number of ways … shopping has become intensely entertaining and this in turn encourages more shopping … This convergence is described as ‘shopertainment’…1
A critique of this process is that cities are as a consequence produced as landscapes of pleasure for visitors. Residents of the city are then either marginalised to the outer circles of cities, where they might emerge to service the tourist centre, or become themselves part of the tourist trail – the resident that makes the urban landscape ‘real’. This is all part of the manner in which cities both attract inbound capital and regenerate. As Holcomb notes:
As tourism has become an ever more vital strategy for urban regeneration, governments and the tourist industry have invested greater amounts of resources on campaigns to ‘sell’ the city to potential ‘consumers’. This increasingly is how cities are marketed … Public funds are spent on marketing campaigns, and the city ‘product’ is both redesigned and reimaged for visitors rather than for residents.2
The question this poses is who the regeneration of cities is actually supposed to benefit. One of Sharon Zukin’s central concerns is the manner in which ‘the politics of representation plays a significant role in conflicts over [the] economic revitalization’ of cities.3 According to her, ‘the politics of representation is … shaped by concrete questions of who owns, occupies, and who controls the city’s public spaces’.4 As we will see, such debates become pronounced when mega events are attracted to cities as part of their tourist and regeneration strategy. For example, the gaining of the right to host the Olympic Games seems to be now often followed by legislation which enables the ‘clearing’ of the streets of the homeless, poor and others that might ‘affront’ the sensibilities of visitors.5
The manner in which cities are recast for the purposes of tourism does not simply give rise to spatial dislocation for local people. Their urban culture and history can also be rewritten. Abrahamson notes that in effect to make cities more attractive for visitors:
[t]his may, of course, require some manipulation or reinvention of culture and history that will leave some locals feeling left out of the public representation of the place. Farmers, unemployed laborers, and others may feel that the selling of an industrial museum in their city presents an inauthentic cultural representation, or at least one that seriously departs from the meaning of the place that they share.6
The tourist city is a contested city. As we have discussed in earlier chapters this is in effect acknowledged in various documents initiated by the World Tourism Organization which seek to transform the practice of tourism into more responsible behaviour. For example, the Manila Declaration on World Tourism 1980 recognises the impact that tourism can have on social and economic development by aiming to connect tourism with a commitment to social justice and world peace. The 1982 Acapulco Document notes that ‘domestic tourism enables the individual to take possession of his own country’ and that ‘States should improve their understanding of the role of domestic tourism and give more attention to its social, educational and cultural terms.’ The 1985 Tourism Bill of Rights and Tourism Code highlights the need for such matters as the need for tourists to respect the ‘customs, religions and other elements of [the] cultures’ of host communities,7 and behave in a manner which ‘foster[s] understanding and friendly relations among peoples’.8 Such statements can only be understood through the recognition that tourism does create contests for both material and cultural space in cities.
The Global Code of Ethics for Tourism, as we have noted, also emphasises the importance of ‘responsible tourism’ in Article 1(1):
The understanding and promotion of the ethical values common to humanity, with an attitude of tolerance and respect for the diversity of religious, philosophical and moral beliefs, are both the foundation and the consequence of responsible tourism; stakeholders in tourism development and tourists themselves should observe the social and cultural traditions and practices of all peoples, including those of minorities and indigenous peoples and to recognize their worth.
Again, such documents can only be understood as a recognition that tourism has often been an irresponsible force as the tourist industry pursues profit and tourists pursue pleasure. In attempting to create a new discourse of tourism which casts tourism in more noble terms, such statements also remind us that tourism is a process which creates tensions and contests within urban spaces.
Urban image and the promotion of tourism
Imagery which is used to promote cities helps to create various urban ‘realities’. While such images can provide important symbols which assist in focussing the marketing and promotion of cities (as well as creating a certain ‘feel good’ factor amongst the populace) they also carry the risk of distorting the real nature of the urban scene through concealing other realities. This distortion is no doubt more likely to occur if there is perceived to be economic gain to be realised from using a particular image over others. Thus given the acceptance that mass tourism offers real financial rewards if one can attract those tourists, there is immense pressure on cities to market themselves through images which project the city in a way which is thought to be attractive to those tourists.
As Boniface and Fowler remark:
‘Urban heritage’, manifestly eclectic and elastic, has been sharpened as an economic tool, for towns, as always, need their trade.
Tourists, however, do not see themselves merely as trade tokens. They want quite a lot of a town, and this is where the clashes of interest can begin to develop. In the first place, a city or town has to seem to be attractive from a distance in order to attract the attention of the potential visitor. While the serious scholar will go wherever his or her original sources in art gallery, museum or archives lie, no one essentially bent on leisure will willingly go somewhere perceived as being ‘worse’ than domestic circumstances. For the same reasons, it is difficult to take a positive decision to go somewhere if the attraction to make one do so is not clearly defined. Furthermore, there’s not much point in going to a town that no one back home has heard of: where are the social-status Brownie points in visiting ‘anywheresville’ (unless you can elevate it over suburban sherry to the undiscovered place where everybody will be touring two years hence).9
We argue that the pressure to create a particular image can have two significant consequences. The first is the non-representation and subsequent denial of other views of the city; and second, the tendency to preserve only those parts of urban heritage which are consistent with the marketing image resulting in the loss of those parts of the urban scene which are not so consistent.
Alternative layers of the city
In one sense what makes a city a place worthy of visiting is what makes it ‘different’ but as Boniface and Fowler point out there tends to be a certain sameness in what tourists are fed as part of the tourism experience. They remark:
What a paradox if, all over the world, tourists are travelling to visit cities and towns that are different and yet, unless they make the effort to eschew the tourist and ‘do their own thing’, everywhere everyone is being fed the same soup – ‘heritage’ minestrone: the contents differ in detail but the concoction is still minestrone. As one travel brochure rather surprisingly asked, making the point that its tours induced ‘delightful confusion: a half-remembered kaleidoscope’, ‘Did we feed the ducks in Geneva or Lausanne?’10
Such an approach ignores the many other layers which contribute to the make-up of cities. But it is also clear that Boniface and Fowler are saying more than this. What they are critical of is the way in which such ways of packaging cities ignore what tourists often want to experience. In their view tourists come to a place with complex motivations and desires – they want to see what is different about a place – but this complexity is usually ignored when cities are presented to tourists. They continue:
Understandably, every urban place needs its local heroes for its own self-esteem; better still if it can glow with pride at an association with someone of national or greater standing. Nevertheless, such figures tend to be inflated in significance to meet the needs of the ‘mostest’ type of tourism – who after all wants to visit the home or museum of a nobody? – while, at this level of mini-bus heritage tourism, interesting but controversial issues such as social variety, ethnic diversity, and social and ethnic deprivation are clearly not part of urban heritage. Pity: such are among the traits which make cities different and dynamic as well as interesting.11
This leads to the question of whether tourism should ignore such diversity in the urban environment. Of course, to confront these ‘other’ faces of the city means that the tourist will often come into contact with less fashionable images of the city – at least as far as powerful interests who inhabit the city are concerned. That is, there is clearly every reason why those who wield power and influence within a city have little to gain from tourists leaving the city with the view that such power and influence is not exercised for the benefit of all who live there.
Boniface and Fowler thus ask whether tourism should investigate such issues:
Does tourism have an educational role? If not, fine, let’s just enjoy ourselves and confine our perceptions of heritage to pleasantries; but if it does, – and many tourists do travel for self-education – then perhaps the tourist menu, the very concept of urban heritage indeed, should be broadened.12
The notion that the concept of urban heritage should be broadened is most challenging. For what a city chooses to preserve as its heritage is closely tied to its self-image and thus the way it wants to present itself to visitors. If a city regards its various layers as important components of its heritage then such a city will preserve (and thus present) a far different image of itself than a city which regards the deeds of the rich and powerful as what makes it a worthy place. When a city has a significant part of its heritage destroyed either willingly through government action or through the deliberate destruction of heritage through civil war, such as that in the former Yugoslavia, part of the soul of the city is gone for ever.
Marketing the city and the loss of its (legal) soul
A case study – the construction of modern Brisbane and the Gold Coast
One example of a city losing much of its built heritage and how the layers of meaning of a city can be quickly eradicated is that of the City of Brisbane, Australia, which underwent a rapid remaking of its image during the 1970s. Brisbane is the State capital of Queensland and was fast becoming a ‘growth’ state much in the image of California. The promise of warm weather and the abolition of death (inheritance) taxes attracted retirees from Southern States. But wealth could not just be built on the backs of an ageing population. The then (conservative) Bjelke-Petersen State government had a desire to present an image of a modern Brisbane which would also attract capital to the State for industrial growth. Its climate also attracted tourists and its proximity to natural attractions (such as the Great Barrier Reef) positioned it as a major centre for tourism. But until this time Brisbane had a visual image as that of a ‘large country town’. Simply, it did not have the appearance of a modern city which in itself represented a ‘destination’. It was yet to become ‘Brisvegas’, the ‘fantasy city’ in Hannigan’s terms. In creating a ‘modern’ city in those terms the Government then set about destroying a large amount of its built heritage.
The changing image of this city at this particular historic point in time provides a snapshot of the power of governments to change the image of a city and in particular the power of governments to act where there is little legislative restraint to protect heritage. Under the long reign of the Queensland Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen from 1968 until 1987 Brisbane was promoted as a clean, safe and modern city. It was marketed as a friendly, welcoming place for both domestic and international tourists. Bjelke-Petersen has been attributed with putting Queensland on the tourist map and in doing so creating a ‘new Brisbane’. What we are concerned with here as an aspect of this process is the manner in which the visual image of the city was recast to meet this agenda. Thus in an attempt to better portray this image many old-style Queenslander buildings13 and other old long-standing buildings were demolished in central Brisbane and new buildings put up in their place creating an instant ‘modern Brisbane’.
Whereas heritage in all its facets has long been recognised internationally as a draw card for tourists, in comparison with many other countries Australia has been slow to recognise the value of protecting its built heritage for tourism. It was not until the 1970s, when UNESCO officially adopted the term ‘heritage’ to encompass both the built and natural remnants of the past,14 that a number of states in Australia introduced protective legislation for the built heritage.15 Prior to this time the National Trust had been the only major group which had shown any determined interest in the preservation of ‘old buildings’.16 It was during this time when other Australian states were introducing legislation to protect their built heritage that the State of Queensland undertook to demolish many of its most significant heritage buildings. In fact it was not until the 1990s with a new government in place that Queensland enacted heritage legislation.
The image of a modern Brisbane that the then government wanted to construct was not thought to be consistent with old Queenslander-style buildings and so the Bjelke-Petersen government demolished as many of those buildings as it could. Fisher’s description of the period leaves the reader with a sense of the destruction during this time: ‘Between the mid-1970s and early 1990 over 60 significant buildings bit the dust in central Brisbane, as the pre-war town was transformed into a nondescript high-rise city.’17 The demolition of these buildings did not take place with the full support of the community. On the contrary many of the buildings were listed by the National Trust and there were many concerned protestors, but the legal redress available to the community was minimal. With no state heritage legislation in force, a government with a particular vision of the modern city, and with close private business connections that supported this vision, had little to prevent it from achieving its aims. One particular example, the Bellevue Hotel, would have qualified as a highly prized heritage attraction today. A detailed description of the Bellevue Hotel provided by Fisher gives us some idea of what a glorious building it once was:
this delightful three-storeyed rendered brick hotel, listed by the Australian Heritage Commission as part of the National Estate, had been designed by J.J. Cohen in colonial renaissance style at the height of the 1880s boom, its street awnings and verandah balconies dripping with filigree cast iron. Built in 1886 at the corner of George and Alice streets each façade was further enhanced by a central mansard-roofed turret echoing the roofline of parliament house across the way.18
The building was razed late one evening in 1979. The demolition crew was brought in under police protection as angry members of the community protested to no avail.19 This hotel, under the since-enacted state heritage legislation would no doubt have been protected on a number of grounds such as its aesthetic, architectural, historic and social significance to the present generation or past or future generations.20
The ongoing destruction of heritage buildings was to a large extent inevitable under the Bjelke-Petersen era as the government held considerable power and was able to continue demolishing buildings late at night in an attempt to avoid protestors. Private wrecking operators such as the Deen brothers were also only too willing to help out. Fisher points out that their then business card summed up the situation nicely: “Moreover the Deen brothers – George, Ray, Happy, Louie and Funny – like the legendary dwarfs were available for hire at all hours according to their business card, their motto being ‘All we leave behind is the memories’.”21
Marketing Brisbane as the modern city was not the only project the government had in its quest to capture the tourist dollar. Establishing the Gold Coast city as a highly desirable destination was another major feat for the Bjelke-Petersen government which had many similarities with the redevelopment of Brisbane. This project, although not involving the demolition of heritage buildings, nevertheless, as with Brisbane, had as its focus the construction of a ‘modern’ city through the building of numerous high-rise self-serviced apartments, together with luxurious hotels and a number of golf courses to cater for the anticipated tourist boom. Patrick Mullins neatly coins the creation of this massive Gold Coast development as ‘Tourism urbanization is the process by which cities and towns are built or re-developed explicitly for tourists’.22
The State of Queensland has for many years been active in attracting a tourist market promoting just such an image. While part of the lifestyle image promoted for Queensland has included a number of beach towns, it is the Gold Coast city which has been promoted to both the internal tourist market as well as the international tourist. Marketing of the intangible such as the promise of the beach lifestyle has been a very effective draw card for this city. Holcomb points out that so far as the image creation of the city is concerned much of what cities offer throughout various parts of the world have the same sorts of qualities. He asks: ‘How, then, does the generic city, one with a range of suitable but not extraordinary attractions, market itself to compete with other similar cities?’23
One way he suggests this can be achieved is for a city to have a landmark. For the Gold Coast it has been the accessible Australian beach combined with the relaxed ‘Australian way of life’ and ‘unique’ cultural landscape. In a similar vein, various coastal cities in Spain have been packaged to the English tourist in almost the exact same manner with ‘Spanish lifestyle’ replacing that of Australia. But another enduring symbol and ‘landmark’ of the Gold Coast is the ‘modern’ skyline of high-rise buildings. It is this that possibly delivers the visual image that marks the place as worthy of becoming a destination. This image, together with that of the ‘new Brisbane’ would not have been possible without the legal vacuum which existed at the time many of its heritage sites were being removed.
Nor are the events in Brisbane unique. Cities globally are re-inventing themselves in this manner. Blackpool in the United Kingdom is undergoing a transformation from ‘the Mecca of the English working class’ during the nineteenth century and into the twentieth century24 to a place now described as ‘trendy’.25 This is explained in tourist literature:
Blackpool has and is undergoing so much change. Blackpool now has a whole host of boutique accommodation, dispelling the myth of the land-lady in her rollers. Blackpool’s attractions are also getting a makeover as well as the tram system. The new headland in front of Blackpool tower will attract huge concerts, and the new seafront is beginning to take shape.26
So much about reconstructing the city for tourism also involved de-constructing. The question this raises is exactly which parts of the past should be preserved in this process?
Defining and preserving heritage
A view of heritage which explores the many layers of the city and seeks to preserve them is arguably much more likely to produce a richer tourism experience for those who visit. And importantly, it may be that such a city goes much further in satisfying the complex needs of tourists than a city which serves up the ‘standard fare’: ‘Towns and cities are actually much more interesting than the tourist is often allowed to appreciate – and there is no need for the visitor’s experience of urbanitas to be effectively short-changed.’27
The urban heritage is of course largely constructed through legislative regimes and remains a highly political arena where developers and heritage professionals often remain locked in conflict. Both may have some (among other matters) regard to tourism with their ultimate objective but may have very different expectations as to how the tourist will engage with the built heritage. A building which is to be retained for business purposes with a focus first on profit may be dealt with very differently from a building that is to be saved for its heritage value alone. When it comes to defining heritage the interpretation of relevant legislation becomes all important for developers and heritage professionals alike.
In Australia, at the Federal level, the Australian Heritage Commission Act 1975 (Cth) until recent years created the ‘national estate’. Once registered as part of the national estate various processes allowed for the protection of places registered as part of the national estate. The criteria for determining whether a place was part of the national estate was set out in section 4 of the Act as stated:
4(1) For the purposes of this Act, the national estate consists of those places, being components of the natural environment of Australia or the cultural environment of Australia, that have aesthetic, historic, scientific or social significance or other special value for future generations as well as for the present community.
This Act has now been repealed and replaced by the Environmental Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth) but the broad definitions of the repealed legislation have been retained in the current Act. The heritage value of a place is defined to include: the place’s natural and cultural environment having aesthetic, historic, scientific or social significance, or other significance, for current and future generations of Australians.28 Section 341D of the Act provides that the criteria for a place having heritage values shall be prescribed by the Regulations under the Act.
The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Regulations 2000 provide the criteria for determining heritage for the Commonwealth:
The Commonwealth Heritage criteria for a place are any or all of the following:
(a) the place has significant heritage value because of the place’s importance in the course, or pattern, of Australia’s natural or cultural history;
(b) the place has significant heritage value because of the place’s possession of uncommon, rare or endangered aspects of Australia’s natural or cultural history;
(c) the place has significant heritage value because of the place’s potential to yield information that will contribute to an understanding of Australia’s natural or cultural history;
(d) the place has significant heritage value because of the place’s importance in demonstrating the principal characteristics of:
(i) a class of Australia’s natural or cultural places; or
(ii) a class of Australia’s natural or cultural environments;
(e) the place has significant heritage value because of the place’s importance in exhibiting particular aesthetic characteristics valued by a community or cultural group;
(f) the place has significant heritage value because of the place’s importance in demonstrating a high degree of creative or technical achievement at a particular period;
(g) the place has significant heritage value because of the place’s strong or special association with a particular community or cultural group for social, cultural or spiritual reasons;
(h) the place has significant heritage value because of the place’s special association with the life or works of a person, or group of persons, of importance in Australia’s natural or cultural history;
(i) the place has significant heritage value because of the place’s importance as part of indigenous tradition.29
A broad definition of heritage has thus remained the legislative model for the Commonwealth for over 30 years.
It is important to note that nothing in the current or repealed legislation identifies the importance of a place as a tourist attraction (or likely tourist attraction) in determining whether a place should become part of the national estate. The Hawke Report which reviewed the Federal heritage legislation also did not mention tourism. But, of course, it is well understood that the national estate has such a strong connection. This follows from the comments of Boniface and Fowler who identify the extent to which it is assumed that tourists want to experience ‘mostest’ tourism – that is, visit places that have special significance. It is noteworthy that both Acts utilise terms such as ‘special’, ‘importance’ and ‘strong’ in setting down its criteria for entry into the register of the national estate. A review of the Australian legislation in 2009 also recommended that the law be re-enacted and renamed the Environment Act with a new set of objects including the protection of ‘matters of national environmental significance and, consistent with this, seeks to promote beneficial economic and social outcomes’.30 This was recommended because:
establishing an object that promises strict environmental protection when it is clear that in certain circumstances social and economic considerations will legitimately be brought into decision-making, risks drawing the legislation into disrepute and should be avoided.31
Clearly, one of the economic benefits to be derived from heritage is that earned through tourism. While the Hawke Report does not expressly refer to tourism, the tourism White Paper issued by the Australian Government in 200332 had 17 references to ‘heritage’. Some of these stressed the economic benefits:
Around 77 million hectares or nearly 10 per cent of Australia’s land area is designated as protected. In addition, a large portion of Australia’s16 million square kilometres of ocean are under the jurisdiction of the Australian Government and much of this is being managed as marine protected areas. National parks and world heritage areas are the heart of this system and are essential to Australia’s tourism industry.33
The White Paper noted that visits to national parks alone constituted 84 million visits generating $54 million on revenue in 2001–2 but that ‘despite the obvious importance of such visitation to both the tourism industry and the national park sector, these players are often seen as having divergent interests rather than working together to pursue common goals’.34 This is again the tension between sustaining the environment on the one hand and making it available for economic gain. This presents particular challenges in the case of significant natural heritage sites such as the Great Barrier Reef. In that context the White Paper made the comment that: