2.1. Green Tourism in the Post-COVID-19 Era
Green tourism is increasingly becoming a subject of academic interest as we have more and more tourism products positioned as green and responsible. However, many tourists only understand this type of tourism in a narrow context, only as the best way to enjoy holidays and nature [
26]. Green tourism, on the other hand, has much more to offer, not only allowing active leisure in the natural environment but also contributing to the protection of the environment. As indicated by Andari and Setiyorini [
27] (p. 18), “the purpose of green tourism is providing insight and concern with the environment, and increasing greater appreciation for nature”. The concept of green tourism, although generally widely understood, is not uniformly defined in the literature.
Table 1 shows a collection of green tourism concepts and definitions.
The development of green tourism applies the criteria of sustainable tourism, the main objective of which is the responsible use of resources and their conservation in order to preserve them for future generations [
28,
31]. Currently, one of the main objectives is to reduce the negative impacts of tourism development, in particular reducing energy consumption and GHG [
6,
32]. Green tourism therefore primarily refers to environmentally friendly tourism and helps to counteract the negative effects of development [
30].
Mass tourism has had a negative impact on natural and cultural resources, with sometimes uncontrolled tourist attendance causing irreversible damage to individual tourist sites [
33]. Currently, many tourist destinations are experiencing negative externalities such as congestion, a decline in the quality of life of local residents, poor access to socio-cultural amenities, and a loss of local identity [
34,
35]. This is the result of tourism development geared solely to economic benefits and growth [
28,
36].
This sector needed a certain “shock” to reflect on the problems that were exacerbated by the unsustainable growth of mass tourism. The COVID-19 pandemic, periods of lockdowns, and restrictions had a significant impact on the tourism sector. Lockdowns of countries had an impact on changing travel behaviour. Many authors in their studies emphasise that tourists have rediscovered green space in their cities and a kind of return to nature has been observed, which also, in the post-COVID-19 era, has remained a popular leisure activity [
37,
38,
39,
40,
41,
42,
43]. Also, an increasing number of tourists have found tourist products that have been created as a result of sustainable development and that promote slow tourism (characterised by time, conscious decision making, engaging the senses, holiday duration and location, and anti-commercialism) [
44,
45,
46].
Green tourism is important for encouraging travel that would help support natural and cultural aspects while encouraging respect for and protection of urban resources and cultural diversity [
30]. Green tourism should also include the sustainable use of water and energy; prevention of air, land, and water pollution; and protection of biodiversity [
26,
47]. The development of this type of tourism can also contribute to reducing greenhouse gas emissions, for example, by moving to renewable energy sources [
6]. Energy-efficient aircraft, a shift to renewable energy, new-generation energy technologies, and measures of energy efficiency in hotels would also contribute [
6].
2.2. Green Mobility and Factors for Choosing Mobility Means
The increase in human mobility has been influenced not only by the increase in purchasing power and the growing availability of tourist regions or cities around the world but above all by the emergence of relatively cheap means of transport [
34]. Nowadays, due to climate change and increasing pollution, the concept of green travel has been proposed as a possible solution to mitigate the negative environmental impact of increased mobility [
47]. Green travel, derived from the concept of green transport, aims to persuade residents to choose modes of transport that are energy-efficient, reduce pollution, and are beneficial to the health of residents (including bus, metro, carpooling, walking, cycling, etc.) [
48].
Social sustainability is linked to green mobility (e.g., public transport, walking, cycling) as a way to alleviate individual carbon footprints [
49]. The aim is for transport used in tourism to have the least negative impact on the environment [
50]. More recently, researchers have suggested that the carbon footprint of tourism can be reduced through strategic market development aimed at reducing the distance travelled for holidays, especially by air and car.
At the beginning of the 21st century, in developed countries, about 40% of the distance travelled was by car, 5% by plane, and 55% by other means of transport, while in developing countries, the car accounted for 20% and other means of transport accounted for 80% [
50]. In cities, by contrast, the car generally remains the dominant means of transport in Europe [
51] and a major contributor to ever-increasing hazardous emissions [
52]. Every kilometre travelled by car or bicycle generates a cost to society, although the cost of driving is more than six times higher (EUR 0.50/km) than cycling (EUR 0.08/km) [
53].
Sustainable mobility includes both public transport and active/”zero-emission” transport (walking and cycling); it contributes significantly to reducing greenhouse gas emissions [
49]. Among the popular ways to reduce GHGs is to encourage tourists to use public transport (e.g., trains, buses, and ferries), which not only guarantees better accessibility to the destination but also increases green mobility [
19]. However, this is only a piecemeal action in the pursuit of a green economy.
Despite these actions, the plane is a more popular means of transport because of the travel time savings and because travelling by bus is less attractive due to the uncertainty of the bus journey and the uncertainty with the travel time [
54]. Therefore, as Gössling et al. [
55] emphasise, the main means of transport generating GHG emissions is air transport. The COVID-19 pandemic and the closure of countries have contributed to a reduction in air travel [
14]. As Wu et al. [
7] point out, a reduction of up to 7 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions worldwide was observed during the period of restrictions. One of the reasons for this was that many airlines reduced flights by more than 90% and some stopped flying altogether, and this caused airport closures [
56]. However, after the end of the pandemic restrictions, there has been a steady increase in the number of flights (despite rising fuel costs and higher flight prices), not only of passengers but also of flights on private jets. As an example, we would like to mention the results from the Greenpeace report, which shows that the use of private jets in Europe increased by 64% in 2022 compared to 2021, reaching a record number of 572,806 flights, and that carbon dioxide emissions from private flights more than doubled [
57] (p. 6). The number of private flights tripled within a short period of time after the end of the pandemic and, in addition, the amount of CO
2 emissions in Europe more than quadrupled in 2021 compared to 2020, from 354,690 tonnes to 1,637,623 tonnes [
57] (p. 6). The same trends were observed in the following year [
57].
Therefore, green mobility should be promoted not only in a narrow sense (e.g., cycling) but also as a major factor influencing GHG reduction. What factors play an important role when choosing a means of transport for Generation Z (Gen Z) tourists? As the literature indicates, the choice of green mobility is influenced by a number of factors, of which the most frequently mentioned are gender, age, and educational level. In the case of age, a U-shaped relationship between age and the proportion of travel by public transport is most commonly observed, although for some countries, an inverted U-shaped relationship also occurs [
49]. Jia [
58] shows that age is an important factor in choosing green mobility. In terms of gender, it is highlighted that there are statistically significant differences between genders in the choice of travel patterns [
58], and green travel is most often chosen by women than by men [
49,
58]. In the case of education level, the literature also stresses that this is an important factor [
49,
58], although depending on the education, this influence can be a positive (secondary education) or a negative correlation (higher education) [
49]. Other factors that can also have a significant impact are place of residence, car ownership, public transport, and income [
49]. As Haustein and Nielsen [
51] and Echeverria et al. [
49] point out, the country of origin can also play a statistically important role when choosing a green mean of transport. As Jia [
58] points out, the typical tourist who chooses green mobility is women under 30 and over 50, with higher education, with low car ownership and high income. The literature indicates also that factors such as the economic factor (interest in financial knowledge and savings [
59], the tourist’s financial situation [
60,
61], desire to enjoy the landscape, novelties, and environmental awareness [
5,
62,
63] are important to Gen Z representatives and can influence the tourist destinations they choose. Therefore, in the context of the second research question of this paper, it can be suspected that economic, environmental, and cognitive landscape factors may influence Gen Z’s propensity to green travel.
However, there is still much to be carried out to expand the use of green transport means. To achieve this, there is a need not only to improve public transport services and invest in and promote walking/cycling behaviour but also to understand who is involved in green mobility [
49]. Also, the environmental knowledge of tourists should be increased, as this can influence current and future low-emission behaviour [
64].
2.3. Gen Z Travellers and Their Attitude to the Risk
Travelling for young people is an integral part of their lives and not a temporary escape from everyday life as it is for the older generation [
65]. In this article, we would like to focus in particular on students from Generation Z who have the opportunity to participate in the Erasmus+ programme and benefit from green travel.
Students and their preferences, goals, and motives are of interest to researchers but unfortunately only piecemeal in the area of sustainable tourism topics. The findings of Eusébio and Carneiro [
66,
67,
68] have shown that we are dealing with certain groups of young tourists. For some, economic motives are more important, and for others, cultural and natural resources and entertainment offers or products based on sustainability are more important. Analyses of young people’s preferences many times showed differing findings, as their motives are influenced by the external environment to a greater extent than those of other consumer groups [
65,
69].
In addition, research has mainly focused on the Millennial generation, but now there is a new Generation Z in the tourism sector, which has characteristics that set it apart from other travellers. Gen Z tourists are described by researchers as “the-internet-in-its-pocket-generation” [
70] (p. 33). Nechad [
71] underlines that people from Generation Z have pro-environmental inclinations, i.e., they want their actions to be characterised by the sustainability of natural resources and the maintenance of development abilities for future generations. As indicated by the literature [
62,
72,
73], Generation Z grew up in extremely unstable conditions (war on terror, refugee crises, and climate change), which made safety a value for them. However, as Gabrielova and Buchko [
74] add, people from Generation Z, due to being brought up by protectionist parents, do not want to take responsibility and take precautions in risky situations. Taking into account the third research question in this paper, it can therefore be suspected that the level of risk taking of people from Generation Z may affect their tourist preferences, including in relation to green travel. Although the literature indicates what the main motives and predispositions of this generation are [
75,
76,
77,
78], we still have too little information about the extent to which sustainable tourism [
79] and green travel are important to them. It is worth noting that this generation grew up in smaller households, had more money of their own, and had more opportunities to explore the world [
80].
Young people’s lifestyles and identities are becoming more diverse, and “for some, cars are still a central element in their lifestyle, for others they are nothing more than a means of transport” [
81] (p. 13). Therefore, they are keen to rent bicycles or electric scooters. They also sometimes choose less traditional or alternative means of transport when travelling. There are also campaigns to encourage a change in transport choices. In Catania, for example, there was the “You study, you travel free” initiative to encourage students to use public transport instead of their own car [
82]. In this way, students’ environmental awareness is increased, which may, in the future, influence their choice of transport during domestic and international trips.
As indicated by research conducted by “Cox and Kings”, around 72% of young tourists from India would prefer to visit Europe by bike, bus, or train [
77]. As Cavagnaro, Staffieri, and Postma [
70] prove, young tourists tend, third, to skip on travel and accommodation costs to spend more on the destination.
In summary, we can distinguish the following groups of motives for young tourists: internal self-development, external self-development (communication), entertainment, and escape from reality (relaxation) [
70]. It is worth adding that natural attractions are also at the top of the list of interests of young tourists [
83].