Research On Tourism Carrying Capacity Based On Gray Evaluation

The famous theory "Tragedy of Commons" considers that in a situation that doesn't have property right or clear property right, the rational people will increase the use of commons and eventually, the commons is destroyed. In the 1870s, tourism is considered as a non-smoke industry that can rely on natural resources or cultural resources of the destination to develop economy, but with unplanned rapid development, almost every destination is facing destruction of tourism resources and degradation of tourist environment, so tourism environmental problems are attracted more and more attention. With the concept of sustainable development, tourist carrying capacity, as an important basis of tourism sustainable development, causes extensive attention of scholars both in and abroad and has become a key research domain for tourism subject, environmental science, economics, management and etc.In this research, based on the summary of studies in and abroad, the insufficiency of the domestic study and the thoughts of LAC & VERP framework, the dissertation builds the basic ideas and thoughts. From the perspective of limits of acceptable change and the ideal state, the dissertation chooses urban tourism environment system of Qingdao as a research object, tries to build evaluation index system of tourism carrying capacity, and further uses the improved gray evaluation to evaluate it comprehensively, which can provide a new thinking and method to the research of tourism carrying capacity.First, the dissertation analyzes the related theory of tourism carrying capacity to lay the theory foundation for the research. In consideration of the characteristics of regional complex for tourism environment, the definition of urban tourism environment system is defined. Problems of tourism environment are defined and the theory of tourism impact is analyzed. Meanwhile, based on the advanced framework of tourism carrying capacity LAC & VERP, a LAC & VERP-based concept of tourism carrying capacity is defined and further explained in Tourism Area Life Cycle.Second, the situation of urban tourism environment system is analyzed to provide the background material for the research. The dissertation focuses on the analysis of situations in the study area like tourism environment situation, level of tourism industry and tourism environmental problems, which prepare the content of ideal state for tourism carrying capacity. The relationship of urban agglomerations of Shandong peninsula and Qingdao in urban tourism carrying capacity is analyzed to explain the necessity of studying this composite area.Third, the dissertation tries to assess tourism impact in Qingdao from the view point of residents'perception to provide the contents of limits of acceptable change for tourism carrying capacity. Based on the evaluation index system, the basic data is obtains from questionnaires. Residents'judgments on tourism effect class of each index are assigned value to obtain effect value, and judgments on effect preference class are assigned value and built judgment matrixes to obtain effect weight. At last, the comprehensive evaluation results are acquired by integrated calculation and classification standard.Finally, an evaluation index system of tourism environmental capacity for urban tourism environment system is built and further assessed by advanced gray evaluation. Index values are acquired by statistic yearbook; Index standards are defined by index values of the standard regions, which have similar size but more higher level of tourism industry compared with the study area; Weights of the evaluation system are determined by Principal Component Analysis and Expert Consultation. At last, the evaluation results about whether tourism environment meets the ideal state or tourism impacts are acceptable are obtained and accordingly, management countermeasures of urban tourism carrying capacity of Qingdao are put forward.Through the above studies, this paper makes some new ideas and conclusions, mainly including:(1) The study shows that the economic impact of tourism in Qingdao is positive, and the environmental and social impacts are both neutral, but the ultimate tourism impact is also neutral. The government or some institutions should pay more attention to these negative impacts like inflation, gap between the rich and the poor, crowding problems of the transportation and in tourism places, pollution in the bathing beach, noise and inappropriate disposal of solid waste.(2) From the view point of limits of acceptable change and ideal state, the paper builds the evaluation index system of tourism environmental capacity for urban tourism environment system, which includes tourism environmental security system of urban agglomerations, tourism environmental impact system of city and tourism environmental incentive & security system of city. The first system layer covers 6 status layers, which are security layers of natural environment, socio-economy, tourism economy, economic potentiality, location conditions and location coordination, and 16 index factors. The second system covers 3 status layers, which are capacity layer of urban economic impact, environmental impact and social impact, and 13 index factors. The third system covers 2 status layers, which are security layer of urban tourism environment and incentive layer of tourism environment, and 10 index factors. There are 39 index factors in total in the evaluation index system.(3) Through the comparison of economic characteristics among Urban Agglomerations of Shandong Peloponnesian, Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta, Pearl River Delta is determined as standard region for Urban Agglomerations of Shandong Peloponnesian and its index values are defined as the standards of 16 index factors in tourism environmental security system of urban agglomerations(except individual). Based on two cluster analyses, one via by population and land Area and the other via by tourists'number and tourism revenue among Qingdao and twenty-five cities of Yangtze River Delta and Pearl River Delta, and considering characteristics of Qingdao, Hangzhou is determined as the standard region for Qingdao and its index values are defined as the standards of 13 index factors in tourism environmental impact system of city and 10 index factors in tourism environmental incentive & security system of city(except individual).(4) According to the assessment and analysis of tourism carrying capacity for urban tourism environment system of Qingdao, the conditions in tourism environmental security system of Urban Agglomerations of Shandong Peninsula and tourism environmental incentive & security system of Qingdao have disparities with the ideal state, but the disparities are gradually decreased. Tourism environmental impact system of Qingdao is below the acceptable limits, but later slightly over the acceptable limits. Eventually, tourism carrying capacity for urban tourism environment system of Qingdao is inferior to the ideal state, but appears gradually improved trend and is gradually closed to the ideal state. There are also in-depth analyses for status layer in each system layer, which provide scientific basis for the countermeasures managing urban tourism environment system.(5) As to the management of urban tourism environment system, the paper proposes three levels of countermeasures. One is to further perfect tourism environment of Urban Agglomerations of Shandong Peninsula, including improvement of ecological environment to construct ecological urban agglomerations; promotion economic development to build effective urban agglomerations; integrating tourist resources to regional integration's urban agglomerations; improving opening degree to construct dynamic urban agglomerations; strengthening geographical advantage to build high efficient linkage's urban agglomerations; coordinating the development to create harmonious urban agglomerations. Second is to further optimize the tourism environment of Qingdao to create a sustainable system, which has healthy ecology, considerable economic benefit and civilized society. The last is to control tourism impact of Qingdao, such as price hike, atmospheric pollutants, marine pollution, and imperfect public traffic facilities.