Adriatic Route for Thematic Tourism
ADRIATIC-ROUTE represents a project that is based on the use of new ICT (information and communication technologies) as well as on the promotion of awareness and enhancement of the territory in culture and multimedia. It aims at promoting alternative forms of tourism in the Adriatic area through multimodal transport systems. The ultimate goal is to increase mobility in the participating regions for thematic tourism purposes, with special emphasis on gastronomy, while at the same time promoting accessibility from one region / country to the other. The term “Gastronomy” implies both culture and food-beverages, thus it represents a significant sector with great potential in the cross-border area. This goal will be achieved through the development of a Web-GIS platform (available in all partners’ languages plus English) that will bridge tourism/cultural/natural resources and transport systems of the participating regions while at the same time it will improve accessibility to information and services to tourism/cultural/natural resources and transport systems. Mobile applications (for iPhone and Android-based mobile phones) will enhance the platform’s usability and will extend the accessibility to the platform to a wider range of communication media. Furthermore, in order to exploit the full potential of modern communication media, the platform will also integrate social media applications and will be presented as well through social media (facebook, twitter). The platform will promote local identities and will include the following information: • Natural and cultural resources of each participating area, tourism infrastructures, classification according to the specific form of thematic tourism (e.g. cultural, gastronomic, rural, religious, athletic etc.), calendar with relevant events, and map representation with the use of multimedia tools (video, text, photos, virtual tours etc.); • Graphical representation of transport networks, systems and infrastructures and calculation of optimum routes between two points. A certain degree of flexibility regarding the manipulation of content integrated in the platform will be provided in order to accommodate all partners’ requirements; • Mobile applications for the presentation on mobile environment of information regarding natural and cultural resources and GIS (geographic information system) information; • Social media applications and presentations of the platform in social media (such as facebook, twitter, etc.). The specific characteristics, layout, architecture and content of the platform to be built will be scrutinized through the joint analysis / diagnosis, benchmarking and formulation of strategic and operational plans of all participating regions and by active, continuous collaboration and consultation with all relevant local, regional and national stakeholders. It should be highlighted that the project does not entail R&D activities, since it is based on existing, widely used and already tested ICT tools and applications. Moreover ADRIATIC-ROUTE does not overlap existing initiatives at local/regional or even national level, rather it attempts to embrace them in a wider Adriatic context. Target groups of the project outcomes are tourists, researchers, students, enterprises and associations active in the agro-food and tourism industry, cultural organizations and other organizations within the tourism industry.