ENTOURAGE: experiences of ageing and active travel in tourist cities
EN-TOUR-AGE stands for “European tourist cities in transformation: constructing age-friendly tourism mobilities”. It is a two-year research project that combines mobilities, ageing and tourism studies to understand and tackle the negative effects of ‘overtourism’ and work towards an ‘age-friendly tourism’. The project investigates the transformations and weaknesses of urban mobilities in tourist cities, and their effects on the inclusion of older residents and tourists.
The project uses a case study approach to analyse urban mobility transformations in three European tourist cities. First, it analyses the age-inclusiveness of urban mobility and tourism strategies by consulting policy documents and city representatives in Amsterdam, Barcelona and Venice. Second, it applies qualitative and mobile participatory methods in Barcelona to capture the experiences of urban tourist spaces, their links to urban (im)mobilities, and ageing in the city. In particular, the research works with older residents and visitors to the city to discover the qualities and limitations of traversing the city using active travel.
As a result, the project explores new requirements to inform age-inclusive and sustainable mobility strategies and practices, as part of post-COVID-19 recovery and addressing wider urban challenges such as overtourism and population ageing. The project mobilises the knowledge, skills and networks of experts in tourism, urban ageing and smart urban analytics to combine the perspectives of older resident and visitor groups.
Project aims
The study analyses the following interrelated ageing and urban mobility issues:
- the discourses around social inclusion and age diversity that underpin policy strategies of urban transformation and sustainable mobility.
- practices of negotiating urban space: how do older visitors and residents in tourist cities negotiate tourism spaces and engage in sustainable urban mobility?
- the production of urban space through the perspective of mobile and less mobile communities, to understand the potentially marginalising role of mobilities for older groups and individuals.
Principal investigator
Dr Wilbert den Hoed
Research team
Dr Antonio Paolo Russo (Rovira i Virgili University)
Funder
Horizon 2020 (Marie Sklodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship, grant agreement 101032961)
Partner organisations
- Territorial Analysis and Tourism Studies research group (GRATET) of the Rovira i Virgili University (Vila-seca, Spain)
- Cities as Mobility Hubs: tackling social exclusion through smart citizen engagement (SMARTDEST)
- Manchester University’s Urban Ageing Research Group
Contact
Email: wilbert.denhoed@urv.cat