Local tourist system of the city of lviv: Advantages and problems of sustainable development

Abstract

This paper aims at creating indicators of sustainability of Lviv’s local tourist system (LLTS) as a central instrument for improved planning and management of tourism business in the city. The research methods combine an analysis and a survey carried out to supplement the existing official statistics of Lviv’s City Council in February 2019. After processing all the data collected during the study, we were able to determine the key indicators of the destination sustainability, namely places of touristic attractions of the city and tourists’ satisfaction with the destinations. As the results of analysis suggest, main powerful socio-cultural indicators of LLTS include: 1) effectiveness of the Strategy of the city competitiveness; 2) socio-cultural benefits available to the local community such as a growing number of art objects, cultural venues and other assets. Index measuring tourist attractiveness of the city 4,8 and index measuring visitor satisfaction with tourist services 4,4 are key indicators showing the effectiveness of the Strategy of the city competitiveness. The indicators of economical opportunities mainly consist in: 1) favorable conditions for the growth of businesses involved in tourism service; 2) increasing income to the city budget generated by tourism industry. Among the major indicators of weaknesses and environmental threats of LLTS are: 1) uncontrolled construction works in the historical part of the town, 2) limited space for tourists and the increased use of resources, infrastructure overload; 3) the problem of waste disposal. The main indicators and indexes of the sustainable development of tourism in Lviv: economic, environmental and social are analyzed for the first time. In order to assure a long-term planning and effective management of the city’s tourism assets it is essential to run monitoring programs aimed at spotting susceptible areas and determining needs for changes using above mentioned indicators in local touristic development.