| Abstract: | Europe's historic cities face many challenges, including those associated with growing pressure from tourist interest. This paper reviews the general issues for historic cities with significant tourist activity, and then examines the background, purposes and future direction of the English city of Canterbury's visitor management initiative. An open, soft systems model is used to clarify the differing significance of the initiative for selected stakeholder groups with interests in the city, its society, economy, environment and ecology. The significance of the Canterbury City Centre Initiative for other European walled and historic cities is considered briefly in the context of wider town centre management initiatives, and the linkages to wider city planning processes that it exemplifies. Copyright © 2000 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. |
