If it’s too crowded, then it’s too crowded at the popular excursion destinations in the Allgäu or in other holiday regions in Bavaria. This is trivial, and yet Hartmut Wimmer, founder and boss of the Outdooractive platform, through which many hikers plan their tours, reminded them again on Monday. If, for example, a parking lot is full, you can put up signs, block them, and call in the police. “But then it’s already too late. Nobody has a real plan B anymore.” In order to change this, those responsible for tourism in the Allgäu have been increasingly investing in visitor management for several years, which should lead to forecast models as soon as possible. If you are planning a tour for Saturday on Wednesday, you should already receive information on Wednesday about how crowded it will be there – and thus be guided, in case of doubt, to an alternative tour that is just as worthwhile.
Mayors, researchers, tourism directors, they all digitally exchanged information on the subject of visitor management on Monday at the invitation of the Tourismusplattform Allgäu GmbH, the Kempten University of Applied Sciences and the WTZ tourism research institution in Füssen. They agree that there will be no way around visitor management in the future in order to relieve so-called tourist hotspots. And they also agree that, in addition to analogue signposts and the local deployment of rangers, this can best be achieved through digital innovations. As much data as possible must be collected about day trippers and destinations. And this data, in turn, must not only state that it is too crowded at the Schrecksee, for example. They have to be automatically converted by algorithms into recommendations that can be reliably obtained days before the actual trip and suggest alternatives. This should succeed above all with historical data sets. If a destination in Oberstdorf was overcrowded in previous years with comparable weather, during the comparable holiday season, it will probably come back just the same – that’s the approach.
So, in the future, will we only walk through landscapes in which sensors and satellites track us? This is the question asked by Dirk Schmücker, professor at the Institute for Tourism and Pool Research in Northern Europe and the most prominent German expert on the subject of visitor management, and he answered it unequivocally in the affirmative – according to researchers, to the benefit of the day-trippers. It’s about infrared, laser scanners and smart cameras, but of course also about data from cell phones or other end devices of the guests. Before Corona, says Schmücker, there were isolated counting systems in protected areas. Because the holiday home with the virus has now received a significant boost and the tourist areas in the south and in the north were fully booked like never before, the topic has received a boost.
A data-based operational planning should include weather influences and traffic
Examples of this are the “Air” project, which is intended to advance forecast models for more efficient visitor management as early as the tour planning stage. And the “flexible adventure bus”, which is said to be smarter than conventional bus lines with their rigid timetables. Dynamic, data-based deployment planning should include weather influences and traffic and encourage users to leave their cars at home. According to studies, the majority of day trippers, who mainly contribute to traffic problems in tourist regions, have so far used their own cars. The Bayerncloud research project, which started in 2018, is intended to become the hub for collecting all relevant data. Information about free parking spaces, congested streets, open huts and closed hiking trails should be more easily accessible in the future. A survey at the Schrecksee and the Geisalpsee, for example, showed that half of all day trippers there had previously obtained digital information about the travel destination.
However, Michael Finger from the Bund Naturschutz Oberstdorf criticizes that outdoor portals are part of the problem, why visitor management often does not work. In the Oberstdorf area, for example, every second or third tour is faulty. “It is our homeland that is being burned here.” So you first have to train rangers who look for digital errors and then report them to outdoor platforms. Allgäu GmbH would also like the platforms to take more responsibility for the content and become active themselves. However, tourism experts such as Dirk Schmütter emphasize that it is precisely these platforms that know the day-trippers well and can provide a lot of data. This is needed for the goal of being able to program forecast models – it is not yet enough for the 2022 summer season.