Tourism routes: a scoping review

Abstract

This scoping review provides an overview of the literature on tourism routes, concerning 1) the categorization of tourism routes, 2) how the research has been conducted, in terms of methodologies and main research themes, and 3) future research paths. The review includes documents from four databases, written in English, published until May 2020 and focused on tourism routes as organisations of stakeholders under a unified theme to achieve common goals. Based on 194 documents, regional-scale routes under the theme of food and drink are identified as the commonest. The main research theme is route development. Empirical studies, qualitative approaches, primary data usage, and data collection triangulation techniques predominate. Lastly, future research should focus mainly on route planning and management.