Overview

The wide variety of different types of visitor attraction arguably explains, at least in part, why no unified theoretical framework currently exists to explain and guide the development of either individual attractions or the visitor attraction sector as a whole. Part Two takes four different approaches to examining the development of visitor attractions: a resource-based approach, a geographical approach, a geopolitical approach and a broadly strategy-based approach.

In Chapter 3, Stephen Wanhill begins to address resource-based issues, particularly those of an economic and financial nature. Obtaining funding is problematic for most visitor attractions, not only in terms of the initial capital investment required to develop the visitor attraction, but also in relation to the day-to-day financing of the attraction once it has come into operation. After outlining the historical development of theme parks, Wanhill identifies the major economic and financial challenges, and considers some important aspects of their planning and development. He then goes on to suggest why such challenges arise, and explores how they manifest themselves. Examples are provided throughout Chapter 3 to demonstrate the economic and financial aspects of visitor attraction development, as well as to serve as a vehicle to answer what individual attractions, and the sector as a whole, can do to attract the funding they require. A detailed, true-to-life case study of...