Factors Influencing Visitor's Choices of Urban Destinations in North ...

IV.coefficients from these models provided an assessment of the relative importanceof various attractions in explaining the number of tourist visitations.MethodologyGlobal Insight's approach to this project was to initially conduct a literature review tobecome familiar with the most recent research regarding the appropriate attractivenessindicators to be utilized, the schemes to quantify them for modelling purposes, and thetype of data that were used.Subsequently, Global Insight selected a sample of 50 major metropolitan areas in NorthAmerica with the population size of 500,000 or more to be covered in the attractionsdatabase. Ten of these cities were in Canada, while 40 were in the United States. Thesecities were those that offered a broad range of attractions by themselves. Global Insightdid not include cities that developed a large visitation count by virtue of one main type ofattraction or that relied on attractions that were close to, but not a part of, themetropolitan area itself.Then, Global Insight developed an attractions matrix to classify the attractions into fourcategories that are recognized to draw tourists and consistent across cities. Using thisattraction matrix, the appropriate attractions data were collected for each city. The totalleisure tourist visitations and additional non-attractions data were also assembled.Travel reviews published by Michelin, Frommer's, and Fodor's were selected in order topopulate the attractions matrix with relevant data for each city. These publicationsprovided Global Insight with the wealth of information about various types of attractionsand their quality ratings across the 50 North American cities.Because city attraction portfolios change slowly over time, Global Insight selected across-sectional approach to econometric modelling. This approach allowed Global Insightto pool data across the 50 cities and estimate one equation for each structural relationship.The methodology section of the report will review tasks one through seven. Tasks eightand nine will be discussed in the third section of the report “Discussion of Results.”Table 1: Required TasksTask # Description1 Literature Review2 Select North American Cities3 Implement an Attraction Classification Scheme4 Choose an Econometric Approach5 For Each City, Collect Travel Visitation Data,Attraction Data, and Non-attraction Data6 Select Travel Publications7 Select Measures of Attraction Count8 Construct Economic Model or Models9 Identify High-Return AttractionsSource: Global Insight, Inc.5