IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v14y2022i5p2936-d762927.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Should I Stay or Can I Go? Accessible Tourism and Mountain Huts in Gran Paradiso National Park

Author

Listed:
  • Riccardo Beltramo

    (Department of Management, School of Management and Economics, University of Torino, 218bis Corso Unione Sovietica, 10134 Torino, Italy
    NatRisk—Interdepartmental Research Centre on Natural Risks in Mountain and Hilly Environments, University of Torino, 218bis Corso Unione Sovietica, 10134 Torino, Italy)

  • Stefano Duglio

    (Department of Management, School of Management and Economics, University of Torino, 218bis Corso Unione Sovietica, 10134 Torino, Italy
    NatRisk—Interdepartmental Research Centre on Natural Risks in Mountain and Hilly Environments, University of Torino, 218bis Corso Unione Sovietica, 10134 Torino, Italy)

  • Giulio Mario Cappelletti

    (Department of Economics, Management and Territory, University of Foggia, 11 Via Alberto da Zara, 71121 Foggia, Italy)

Abstract

Within the tourism sector, sustainability has been studied widely at different levels and with different lenses. In the last few years, many research activities have been carried out to assess the social dimension of tourism. Under this perspective, scholars have focused on the accessibility of the tourism and hospitality sectors. This study represents the first-ever attempt to assess how tourists’ physical handicaps or special needs are considered in a very specific kind of accommodation facility: the mountain hut. To do so, semi-structured interviews were conducted with mountain hut managers about four mountain huts—29% of all the mountain huts located in Gran Paradiso National Park, the first established Italian protected area. The results underline both strong and critical points. Considering that many mountain huts are located in severe environments (e.g., medium-high altitudes and reachable only on foot), they have limitations in hosting visitors with physical constraints, who, on the other hand, normally do not attend this kind of facility. By contrast, all of the mountain hut managers were able to satisfy visitors with special food needs, for example, vegetarian, vegan or gluten-free, showing their capability to cope with new forms of tourism demands and expectations.

Suggested Citation

  • Riccardo Beltramo & Stefano Duglio & Giulio Mario Cappelletti, 2022. "Should I Stay or Can I Go? Accessible Tourism and Mountain Huts in Gran Paradiso National Park," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(5), pages 1-16, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:5:p:2936-:d:762927
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/5/2936/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/14/5/2936/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dawson, J. & Scott, D., 2013. "Managing for climate change in the alpine ski sector," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 35(C), pages 244-254.
    2. McIntosh, Alison J., 2020. "The hidden side of travel: Epilepsy and tourism," Annals of Tourism Research, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    3. Ivan Paunović & Verka Jovanović, 2017. "Implementation of Sustainable Tourism in the German Alps: A Case Study," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-15, February.
    4. World Commission on Environment and Development,, 1987. "Our Common Future," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780192820808.
    5. Piervito Bianchi & Giulio Mario Cappelletti & Elisabetta Mafrolla & Edgardo Sica & Roberta Sisto, 2020. "Accessible Tourism in Natural Park Areas: A Social Network Analysis to Discard Barriers and Provide Information for People with Disabilities," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(23), pages 1-14, November.
    6. Joachim Josef Nigg & Sarah Eichelberger, 2021. "Sustainable Product Development for Accessible Tourism: Case Studies Demonstrating the Need for Stakeholder Collaboration," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(20), pages 1-13, October.
    7. Weaver, David B., 2012. "Organic, incremental and induced paths to sustainable mass tourism convergence," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 33(5), pages 1030-1037.
    8. Jianwei Qian & Huawen Shen & Rob Law, 2018. "Research in Sustainable Tourism: A Longitudinal Study of Articles between 2008 and 2017," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-13, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Tek B. Dangi & Tazim Jamal, 2016. "An Integrated Approach to “Sustainable Community-Based Tourism”," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(5), pages 1-32, May.
    2. Nuria Rodríguez-López & M. Isabel Diéguez-Castrillón & Ana Gueimonde-Canto, 2019. "Sustainability and Tourism Competitiveness in Protected Areas: State of Art and Future Lines of Research," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(22), pages 1-32, November.
    3. Rodriguez, X.A. & Martínez-Roget, F. & Pawlowska, E., 2013. "Academic Tourism: a More Sustainable Tourism," Regional and Sectoral Economic Studies, Euro-American Association of Economic Development, vol. 13(2), pages 89-98.
    4. Hamed Rezapouraghdam & Habib Alipour & Huseyin Arasli, 2019. "Workplace spirituality and organization sustainability: a theoretical perspective on hospitality employees’ sustainable behavior," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 21(4), pages 1583-1601, August.
    5. Paola M. A. Paniccia & Luna Leoni & Silvia Baiocco, 2017. "Interpreting Sustainability through Co-Evolution: Evidence from Religious Accommodations in Rome," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(12), pages 1-19, December.
    6. Marco Valeri & Paola Paoloni, 2017. "Competitiveness and Sustainability in Tourism Industry: The Albergo Diffuso Case Study," International Journal of Business and Management, Canadian Center of Science and Education, vol. 12(12), pages 107-107, November.
    7. Laura Serrano & Antonio Sianes & Antonio Ariza-Montes, 2019. "Using Bibliometric Methods to Shed Light on the Concept of Sustainable Tourism," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(24), pages 1-25, December.
    8. Rodica-Manuela Gogonea & Adrian Aurel Baltălungă & Adrian Nedelcu & Daniela Dumitrescu, 2017. "Tourism Pressure at the Regional Level in the Context of Sustainable Development in Romania," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(5), pages 1-24, April.
    9. Mechthild Donner & Anne Verniquet & Jan Broeze & Katrin Kayser & Hugo de Vries, 2021. "Critical success and risk factors for circular business models valorising agricultural waste and by-products," Post-Print hal-03004851, HAL.
    10. Cornelis Leeuwen & Jos Frijns & Annemarie Wezel & Frans Ven, 2012. "City Blueprints: 24 Indicators to Assess the Sustainability of the Urban Water Cycle," Water Resources Management: An International Journal, Published for the European Water Resources Association (EWRA), Springer;European Water Resources Association (EWRA), vol. 26(8), pages 2177-2197, June.
    11. CHEN, Helen S.Y., 2020. "Designing Sustainable Humanitarian Supply Chains," OSF Preprints m82ar, Center for Open Science.
    12. Jim Butcher, 2006. "The United Nations International Year of Ecotourism: a critical analysis of development implications," Progress in Development Studies, , vol. 6(2), pages 146-156, April.
    13. Denise Ravet, 2011. "Lean production: the link between supply chain and sustainable development in an international environment," Post-Print hal-00691666, HAL.
    14. Mara Del Baldo, 2012. "Corporate social responsibility and corporate governance in Italian SMEs: the experience of some “spirited businesses”," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 16(1), pages 1-36, February.
    15. Megan Devonald & Nicola Jones & Sally Youssef, 2022. "‘We Have No Hope for Anything’: Exploring Interconnected Economic, Social and Environmental Risks to Adolescents in Lebanon," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(4), pages 1-17, February.
    16. Buongiorno, Alessandro & Intini, Mario, 2021. "Sustainable tourism and mobility development in natural protected areas: Evidence from Apulia," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    17. Rigby, Dan & Woodhouse, Phil & Young, Trevor & Burton, Michael, 2001. "Constructing a farm level indicator of sustainable agricultural practice," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 39(3), pages 463-478, December.
    18. Michael Howes & Liana Wortley & Ruth Potts & Aysin Dedekorkut-Howes & Silvia Serrao-Neumann & Julie Davidson & Timothy Smith & Patrick Nunn, 2017. "Environmental Sustainability: A Case of Policy Implementation Failure?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(2), pages 1-17, January.
    19. Shiferaw, Bekele & Holden, Stein, 1999. "Soil Erosion and Smallholders' Conservation Decisions in the Highlands of Ethiopia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 27(4), pages 739-752, April.
    20. Ibrahim Ari & Muammer Koc, 2018. "Sustainable Financing for Sustainable Development: Understanding the Interrelations between Public Investment and Sovereign Debt," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(11), pages 1-25, October.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:14:y:2022:i:5:p:2936-:d:762927. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.