The Concept of a Tourist Area Cycle of Evolution: Implications for Management of Resources by R.W. Butler

R.W Butler's Tourist Area Cycle of Evolution explains much of the tourism growth in Turkey in the 80s. Combined with Boosterism (Hall, 1999) much of the mediterranean landscape of Turkey has been attacked by hoards of investors and mass tourists following. I remember reading about towns in South Eastern Turkey where artist would gather to have "Blue Cruises" so to say. Just like Christaller explains in Butler's article, the southern Turkey was first discovered by the artist. One of my favorite books in high school was an autobiography of a well known Turkish author, called the "Memories of a Dinosour" and in there she talked about the exact evolution of the town of Bodrum in the Southern coast of Turkey. She was telling in the book about the poets and the painters that frequented the town back in the day and how they, slowly in time, ran away from Bodrum because of the attack of the tourists.

Now, this cycle seems inevitable for many tourism destinations. You cannot tell someone to not to come, especially if one of the economic drivers of the community is Tourism. So what can be done? There can be improvements on the seasonality of the destination to have a balance in the volume of visitors throughout the year. That can take some of the pressure off, however it may not as well. So here, at this point, it is crucial for one community to work with the other. The interconnectedness of the communities is key in achieveing a balanced and prosperous tourism industry.

When planning, or even just creating a vision, it must be kept in mind that communities are connected as in a web. It is then very important to have an inclusive and integrated plan to cope with the challenges together as well as reaping the benefits together. So even tough it seems like creating a vision for one community is a good idea, if that country has a tourism vision and an integrated plan according to that vision then it can control the usage of resources more efficiently and direct traffic evenly. Smart planning will give the communities some time to refresh themselves as well.

Yes, it is better to do a plan before the area reaches the development stage of the cycle where most of the local control has been lost or given over to the external, more politically and economically stronger parties, however, it is never late to rejuvinate the community. Although it is harder. The main problem the locals feel with the tourism going out of hand is that they lose control over it. They cannot decide what goes on in their back yard anymore and that would be frustrating for the most welcoming person of all.