Tourism and coastal & maritime cultural heritage: a dual relation

Coastal and Maritime Cultural Heritage (CMCH) is an important
asset in coastal areas. However, this heritage has been exposed
to several environmental and human-created threats. This paper
presents three European coastal regions with relevant CMCH and
important tourism destinations: Ria de Aveiro (Portugal), the
Small Isles (Scotland, UK) and Marsaxlokk (Malta). The paper
draws attention to the challenges to CMCH they face, the
dynamics between tourism and CMCH and provides
recommendations for sustainable tourism exploitation of CMCH.
A comparative case-study approach was undertaken, based on 41
semi-structured interviews with key stakeholders. Findings unveil
that, despite the different demographics, socioeconomics and
importance of tourism in each location, CMCH is seen as an
important element to consider as tourism destination.
Stakeholders identified economic, sociocultural and
environmental0 dynamics between tourism and CMCH with
positive and negative impacts on the regions. This study provides
guidelines and recommendations that can be used as a reference
to define a joint policy response for sustainable exploitation of
CMCH in a tourism context.