Design of a Geodatabase for Tourism Infrastructure in Central Asia

Abstract

Central Asia with its high mountains, lakes, deserts, cultural attractions and long history has become an increasingly popular international tourism destination. Thus, the tourism industry is an important economic component for the region’s planning and sustainable development. For a tourist, tour operator or a tourism planner knowing what tourism related infrastructure is currently available, and where provides a valuable input for informed decision making. For this purpose, a GIS application was designed, at the core of which is a geodatabase containing an inventory of current tourism infrastructure assets using Turkmenistan, Tajikistan and Kazakhstan as regional examples. The underlying concept is based on the components of tourism known as “the 4A’s”: attractions, accommodation, amenities and accessibility. We demonstrate the usefulness of this GIS-based tourism inventory by solving various tasks relevant to planning and management, such as: distribution of the 4 A’s; analysis of the tourism infrastructure; and network analysis.