Smart Mapping Tools for the Balanced Planning of Open Public Spaces in the Tourist Town of Golubac, Serbia

Abstract

Cultural tourism is becoming an important factor for local socio-economic perspective today. This is especially visible in smaller remote locations with rich cultural and natural heritage, where the other economic drivers are usually limited due to this remoteness. The proper example for this is the Iron Gates, where local heritage has been isolated by this longest gorge of the Danube. Nevertheless, the boom of cultural tourism has been noticed last years. The problem is that it is very concentrated in the main heritage sites, leaving the other parts without observable socio-economic benefits. Golubac Town at the western entrance of the gorge is such example. This is the only town in the Iron Gates with a historic urban core and the variety of open public space. Although magnificent Golubac Fortress is close and the Danube is the widest in its flow in the front of Golubac, local tourism is still underperforming. This paper aspires to examine the prospects of Golubac Town to become a proper destination of cultural tourism by the comparison of two methods, both based on spatial networking through mapping. The first one is customised space syntax, oriented to the use of open public space by different users as a prerequisite to support the deconcentrated use of wider urban environment. The second method is newer and “smart” – it the mapping of the use of open public space extracted from social media (Tweeter, Instagram, and Flick) and it is more attached to visitors. Using these two methods on the case of Golubac the paper results in the recommendations how to improve traditional urban planning and design for the potential tourist destinations that face the high spatial imbalance of tourist visitors between their parts.