The Impact Of High Speed Rail Opening On Green Economic Efficiency Of Tourism In Yangtze River Economic Zone

The impact of transportation infrastructure construction on tourism has always been one of the hot spots of academic research.In particular,the rapid development of high-speed railroad construction in China since the opening of the Beijing-Tianjin intercity in 2008 has had a profound impact on the development and direction of tourism.Studies have long confirmed the positive impact of high-speed railway construction on tourism,but most have focused on assessing the economic and demand effects of tourism induced by the opening of high-speed railways,while few have focused on the green and efficient development of tourism in cities.The tourism industry itself is highly dependent on the natural environment,yet the rapid growth of the tourism economy is accompanied by the challenge of ecological environmental protection,which in turn leads to inefficient green development of urban tourism.Therefore,this paper combines tourism economic growth,ecological environmental protection and resource conservation,and explores whether the opening of high-speed rail can be used as an opportunity to improve the green economic efficiency of urban tourism,with a view to providing relevant policy references for high-quality tourism development.Firstly,this paper measured the green economic efficiency of tourism based on the non-radial directional distance function(NDDF)by collecting panel data of 108prefecture-level cities in the Yangtze River economic belt from 2003 to 2019;secondly,it assessed the impact of high-speed rail opening on the green economic efficiency of urban tourism and its mechanism of action based on the doubled difference method(DID);finally,it assessed the spatial spillover effect of high-speed rail opening on the green economic efficiency of urban tourism and its spillover boundary based on the Finally,the spatial spillover effects and spillover boundaries of the green economic efficiency of urban tourism by the opening of high-speed rail were evaluated based on the spatial Durbin double difference model(SPDM-DID).The following conclusions are drawn.(1)In general,the green economic efficiency of tourism in the Yangtze River Economic Zone as a whole and in each region is on the rise amidst fluctuations.In terms of spatial distribution:(1)the eastern region of the Yangtze River Economic Belt has the highest growth trend in tourism green economic efficiency,followed by the western region,while the central region has the lowest growth rate,forming the phenomenon of "central collapse";(2)there is a mismatch between urban tourism green economic efficiency and tourism economic growth map.(2)The opening of high-speed rail significantly improves the green economic efficiency of urban tourism.On average,the opening of high-speed rail contributes to a 3.3% increase in the green economic efficiency of urban tourism,which indicates that the construction of high-speed rail contributes to the high-quality development of urban tourism.And this conclusion still holds after a series of robustness tests.Further,in terms of the dynamic impact of HSR opening on the green economic efficiency of urban tourism,the boosting effect appears in the 2nd and 4th years after the opening of HSR.The heterogeneity analysis across regions and cities shows that the opening of HSR promotes the green economic efficiency of tourism in the eastern part of the Yangtze River Economic Belt as well as in the second,third and fifth tier cities.The mechanism analysis shows that the opening of high-speed rail improves the green economic efficiency of urban tourism by virtue of channels such as increasing the scale output of tourism,optimizing the industrial structure,the substitution effect on traditional transportation,and improving the level of innovative technology.(3)In the process of continuously promoting the construction of high-speed rail,the green economic efficiency of tourism in cities in the Yangtze River Economic Belt exhibits positive spatial spillover effects and plays an obvious role in driving the development of green economic efficiency of tourism in neighboring cities.By dividing different spatial distance thresholds,it is found that the spatial spillover boundary of green economic efficiency of tourism in cities by the opening of high-speed rail is 700 km.in addition,the spatial spillover effect of high-speed rail opening on green economic efficiency of tourism in cities is not always a simple positive diffusion effect,but shows a diffusion mechanism of both positive and negative spillover effects.Although high-speed rail can drive the development of green economic efficiency of tourism in the neighboring areas of the station city through spatial spillover,this drive only exists within the "1h isochronous circle"(0 ～350km).On the contrary,the opening of HSR can lead to a significant "siphon effect" on the green economic efficiency of tourism in the neighboring areas of "2h isochronous circle"(350 ～ 700km).