*Article* **Residents' Opinions and Perceptions of Tourism Development in the Historic City of Toledo, Spain**

#### **Luis Alfonso Escudero Gómez**

Department of Geography, University of Castilla-La Mancha, 45071 Toledo, Spain; luisalfonso.escudero@uclm.es; Tel.: +34-925268800-5312

Received: 20 June 2019; Accepted: 11 July 2019; Published: 15 July 2019

**Abstract:** Historic centers have become first-line tourist destinations. In order to achieve sustainable development, it is essential to get to know the opinions of the host community on the impact of tourism, the positives, as well as the negatives. This paper aims to understand the residents' opinions and perceptions of destinations as the historic cities. This research looks into the residents' opinions on the impact of tourism in the historic city of Toledo, Spain. The results of a quantitative survey among 442 residents in the city of Toledo are presented. The study is a revision of the literature and analysis and explanation of an empiric study's results. Descriptive statistics have been used, as well as factor analysis and non-parametric tests to analyze data. The main results point out that residents have a positive vision of tourism development, rather than negative. The economic importance of tourism and its ability to create jobs stand out. However, they also think that the historic center is being turned into a museum for tourists. Analyzing their opinions according to certain demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, some major differences come up, such as that the inhabitants of residential areas have a more positive opinion than those who live in the historic center. Understanding the perspective of the residents can help the managers and planners of the tourism in the city to play down the potential negative impact of tourism and to achieve support from the host community in regards to tourism.

**Keywords:** tourism development; residents' opinions; residents' perceptions; tourism impacts; historic city; cultural tourism; Toledo

#### **1. Introduction**

"They knew everything there was for the tourists, the despised tourists who kept Nova Scotia alive." [1]

The development of tourism results in diverse economic, environmental, and sociocultural changes in daily community life, some of those positive and some negative [2]. The touristic overcrowding increase magnifies these impacts and their consequences on the touristic destinations and their inhabitants. In fact, nowadays, there is an irreversible process of touristification that affects a number of destinations in regards to cultural, economic, political, and social aspects [3]. In these places, the risk of altering the balance of the territorial system in favor of the touristic function is real. It happens particularly in the cities, where territorial transformation and touristic pressure processes are spotted [4]. This phenomenon appears significantly in historic cities. They are the "touristic-historic city", an idea conceptualized by Ashworth and Tunbridge, which they defined as an area of older cities, where the urban structure, architecture, and artifacts are used to create a place-based heritage product [5]. The touristic-historic cities are first line touristic destinations [6]. Their cultural heritage and their particular characteristics make them especially sensitive to the negative impact of tourism. In these cities, the host community has to coexist with a growing number of tourists who fill their spaces. As Aranburu, Plaza, and Esteban conclude, in these urban destinations, it is of the essence to achieve sustainable cultural tourism [7].

The introduction—theoretically and in good practices—of the principles of sustainability in the touristic-historic cities is key to diminishing the negative impact derived from its touristification [3]. It is unarguable that cultural tourism offers many opportunities for touristic-historic cities. However, the strategical planning in regards to sustainability has to be tackled in its touristic development [8]. Making of the touristic activity something sustainable has to be a critical issue [9].

On the other hand, the continuous growth of tourism in historic cities in the last years has caused an increase in popularity in social movements against tourism. It happens so especially in those cities where the touristic flows are very significant, as it happens in the main European touristic-historic cities. Dubrovnik and Venice are two clear examples [10]. In this way, concepts like "overtourism" [11] and, especially, "tourismophobia" have spread out [12]. In this context, it is necessary to understand in an analytical, scientific, and integrated manner, the residents' opinions of tourism. That is to say, clear comprehension of the phenomenon in order to understand how the host community perceives the positive and negative impacts of tourism [10].

Understanding the expectations, needs, and the level of satisfaction of the host community is a key element for the success of any form of touristic development [13]. The support and participation of the hosting society are essential to achieve sustainability in every tourist destination [14]. The members of the community must play an important role in the strategy and action plan of touristic development. They play an important role in successful tourism development [15]. Incorporating the touristic destination inhabitants' perceptions, tourism-resilient communities can be built [16]. Besides, understanding the attitudes and perceptions of the residents towards tourism can mitigate present—and foremost—potential future conflict between the host community and the visitors [10], and hostility towards tourists [17].

Nowadays, it is important to understand how local residents perceive the development of tourism and its impacts on historic cities. The understanding of the host community is essential to achieve success in the touristic development and its sustainability [18]. This research looks into the residents' opinions on the impacts of tourism in the historic city of Toledo, Spain.

How do the residents of Toledo feel about the impact of tourism on their city? This is the main research question. According to classical theory based on the cost-benefit analysis from a social and psychological perspective, introduced by Homans in 1958 and known as the Social Exchange Theory (SET), human beings have a favorable attitude when they are benefited and unfavorable when the cost is increased [19]. Ap makes a case for the implementation of SET in those studies that analyze the resident's perception of tourism [20]. The existing literature has proved that the host community's reactions to tourism are, to a great extent, influenced by the perceptions of the cost versus the obtained benefits [21,22]. Thus, if they perceive that the touristic development reports more benefits than costs, the local community will support tourism and vice versa. For this reason, a key issue that is being brought up in the research is finding out whether the host community of a touristic-historic city, such as Toledo, perceives tourism mainly as a benefit or as a cost. For this, we need to figure out their opinion about the positive and negative impact of tourism in the city. Which do prevail? For instance, does the obviously positive economic impact of tourism in Toledo bring about the prevalence of positive opinions? Or, on the contrary, has the increased influx of tourists made negative opinions to grow, and are we faced with a tourismophobia phenomenon?

It is also interesting to answer other questions, such as: Do basic demographic characteristics—age and gender—have an influence on the opinions of the touristic-historic city's host community? Are the differences in income and in the ownership of a home play a relevant role in those opinions? Can economic tourism-dependence predict the opinion of the residents about tourism development? Equally, it is interesting to get to know whether the residents think that the local council must control the touristic development or not and whether they think they can influence the touristic development in the city.

Answering these research questions sets the main goals for the research. The paper's structure fits these goals. After this introduction, a literature review is made about the residents' attitudes and perceptions of tourism, and the research methodology is explained in detail. Next, the results are addressed analyzing the residents' opinions as a whole and through demographic and socioeconomic independent variables. Finally, it ends with the discussion and conclusion sections.

Planning and tourism policies must take into consideration the residents' attitudes towards the development of touristic activity. Understanding the residents' perspective may help tourism development planning, leading to local development. It can also get greater support for tourism from the host community. On the contrary, if the host community proves hostile towards tourists, this activity could end up declining. In the touristic-historic cities, this information has serious implications on the management of tourism [23]. Thus, this study is relevant for touristic development planners and destination managers. Just as Snaith and Haley point out in their research about the opinions of York's residents about tourism development, their findings may translate into potential policies that highlight the importance of communication with the host community, raising their awareness of the issues, and then marketing the value of tourism internally in order that more residents can feel involved [23] (p. 602).

#### **2. Literature Review**

In studies about tourism from different scientific disciplines, the attitudes, behavior, and perceptions of the tourists have been recurringly taken into account [24]. On occasion, they have been combined and contrasted with the visitors' and the tourist destination inhabitants' opinions [25–27]. Finally, there is a growing number of papers, with different goals and methods in mind, that have contributed to a significatively broader comprehension of the attitudes and opinions of the residents towards tourism. In fact, Nunkoo, Smith, and Ramkissoon did a literature review on the question and used 140 published articles [28]. Sharpley has also reviewed the research on the host community's perception of tourism [29].

This line of research has been established since the 1980s [30,31] and has been developed above all, from the 1990s, in multiple publishings and from research, such as Perdue, Long, and Allen's, on the resident community's support of tourism development [32] or Ap's [20] and Lankford and Howard's [33] on the attitudes towards tourism impact. In 2010, two decades past, getting to know the residents' support and reactions to tourism was still a focal point for researchers, such as Nunkoo and Gur soy [34]. Following this line of research, Jurowki, Uysal, and Williams have carried out a theoretical analysis on the host community's reactions towards tourism [35], and Vargas, Porras, and Plaza have considered the possibility of building a universal model to analyze the residents' attitudes towards tourism and, after implementing it in the Spanish province of Huelva, they reach a positive conclusion as long as the "tourist density" and "perceived touristic development level" variables are taken into account, which according to these authors are missing or barely incorporated into most models [36]. According to Cardoso and Silva, "the conceptual framework and theories used by such research vary significantly" [10] (p. 690). Recently, Nunkoo and So have reviewed this type of analysis and have established a structural model for the study of the residents' support of tourism [37]. Lindberg and Johnson have tried to model the residents' attitudes towards tourism [38]. Sinclair-Maragh et al. have carried out a factor-cluster approach [39]. In the same fashion, Fredline and Faulkner analyze the host community's reactions to tourism through a cluster analysis [40]. In short, according to Cardoso and Silva, "the literature review on residents' attitudes towards tourism evidence that this is a complex analysis, as a number of distinct elements and frameworks can be involved" [10] (p. 691).

One of the main focuses of academic literature about this issue resides on the impacts of tourism on the host community. Consistency amongst researchers relies upon resident perception studies focusing on tourism impacts [41]. Ap [20] and Stylidis et al. [21] focus on how the residents perceive touristic impacts. This issue is the same that concerns Almeida et al. [42], Andereck et al. [43], Bastias and Var [44], Korça [45], Tosun [46], this one in a comparative way between three destinations, and Yen and Kerstetter [47]. Faulkner and Tideswell have devised a framework for monitoring the community impacts of tourism [48]. Pham and Kayat relate the residents' perception of the impacts of

tourism with their support of tourism [49]. Some authors highlight through their research the intensity and importance of some impacts over others. This way, Jurowski et al., following the Social Exchange Theory, favor the relevance of the economic impacts [35]. Other academicians, such as Ward and Berno, prefer to go further than the economic impacts [50]. King et al. opt for focusing exclusively on the social impacts [51], and Broughan and Butler did so previously and through a segmented analysis of the residents' attitudes [31]. In this sense, Pearce et al. devise a Social Representation Theory as an alternative approach to studying the tourism impacts and the attitudes of the local community [52]. Finally, for other authors, the cultural [53], environmental [54], or sociocultural [55] impacts would be the most relevant when it comes to the host community's perceptions.

There is also growing concern about the local host community's support of tourism development analysis, especially about the cost that it may entail for them. The residents' perception towards touristic development concerns Cardoso and Silva [10], Johnson et al. [56], McCool and Martin [57], and Teye et al. [22]. In this concern, researchers have pointed out the importance of the host community's attitude in order for tourism development to be sustainable in the future [15,43]. Choi and Sirakaya [58] have assessed the residents' attitude towards sustainable tourism through the development of a scale.

Other particular aspects have been taken into consideration to assess the residents' opinion about tourism. For instance, Davis, Allen, and Cosenza are interested in doing segmentation of the residents into attitudes, interests, and opinions of tourism and end up distinguishing four categories: The haters, the critical realists, the conscious lovers, and the passionate lovers [59]. The effects of the distance from the touristic focus on the attitudes of the inhabitants of the destination are analyzed by Jurowski and Gursory, who show that, based on different variables, the residents who live closer to the touristic attraction feel more negatively (the users of the recreational facilities) or positively (those sensitive to the environment) than those who live further away [60].

The empirical study of the attitudes, images, opinions, and perceptions of the residents towards tourism development has been carried out in multiple cases around the world. They are carried out in different destinations worldwide and in different types of tourism. Logically, research focused on mass coastal tourism stands out [14,30,61–69]. But there is also similar research in very different fields from beach tourism, such as in rural communities [70,71], in the mountain communities [72], or in national parks [49,73]. The same happens in specific varieties of tourism, such as industrial tourism [74] or therapeutic tourism [18]. Research has also been carried out about the residents' attitudes towards the celebration of great events [17,75].

One of the main research scopes has been cities, such as Koens and Postma's paper on six European cities [76], Ross' about residents' perceptions on the impacts of tourism in Australian cities [77], or Tichaawa and Moyo's in an African developing country, Zimbabwe [41]. City centers are oftentimes the main focus for major tourism [78]. In them, cultural and heritage resources are key elements for touristic development [3]. Thus, among city-center-focused studies, there are published articles about the attitudes and opinions of the residents in different areas with assets declared United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Heritage, such as Krishnaswamy et al., Malaysia [79]; Cardoso and Silva's in Porto, Portugal [10], where cultural and heritage tourism is the core axis of visitors, just as in the case of this present paper, Toledo, Spain; or the one focusing in Portugal by Lourenço et. al in which they analyze the residents' general perception of the impacts of their World Heritage Site nomination, specifically delving in the development of the touristic activities [80]. In these areas, developing sustainable tourism is especially key. But independently from the UNESCO denomination, there is an interest in the residents' attitudes towards heritage tourism development [81]. This way, researchers of the residents' perceptions of tourism have taken on heritage areas, as Chand does for the Indian town of Pragpur [82], in the same way as the cultural cities [83]. In this way, studies in European cities, such as Bruges [16], Canterbury [84], Oxford, in this case contrasting it with the opinions of visitors [25], or York [23] are carried out.

#### **3. Methods**

The article study area is the historic city of Toledo, Spain. Toledo is a city of 84,282 inhabitants in 2018, located in the interior of the Iberian Peninsula. It is located in the center of the Peninsula, 75 km southerly the capital of the country, Madrid—approximately an hour by the highway and half an hour by high-speed train. The city of Toledo, with its medieval old quarter and unique landscapes, has been a protected site since the early 1940s when it was designated as a National Historic-Artistic Site. It was declared a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in November 1986 [85]. Toledo holds the category of touristic-historic city and is today one of the main cultural tourist destinations in Spain. The main characteristics of its development in the present—its realities as well as its issues—have been previously addressed by the author [85]. For instance, one of its main features is that, on top of receiving around a million tourists, it is also visited by over two million day-trippers (there are no official and accurate figures for these data). They are individuals who do not stay overnight in Toledo and who come mainly from the nearby capital of the country, Madrid. This issue has also been previously addressed by the author [86].

The study uses quantitative data in the form of questionnaires. Sharpley showed in their previous work that the majority of studies on our topic use quantitative data in the form of questionnaires [29]. Opinions were tested using empirical data that were gathered from a sample of 442 adult members. According to Di Grino, the required number of answers to achieve a representative sample in a population of 25,000 or more people is 348. This figure allows the trust of 95% inside a margin of error of ±2.5% [87]. Toledo has a population of 84,282 in 2018. Thus, the sample fits the appointed criteria.

The questions in the questionnaire were asked in a non-force approach like previous papers do, such as Stylidis et al.'s, who employ a non-force approach in order to find out how the residents perceive the impacts of tourism and analyze their support to touristic development [21]. This allows the respondents, residents of Toledo, to express positive or negative comments about the perceived touristic impacts. That is to say, their opinions are freely expressed.

The questionnaire in this research was built on references to previous studies on similar topics. Specifically, the questionnaire by Snaith and Haley to obtain the opinion of the residents in the touristic-historic city of York, England, was the main reference [23]. This questionnaire was manufactured, in turn, based on previous work by Perdue et al. [32]. However, the question items were chosen and adapted meticulously keeping Toledo in mind as the destination and based on a previous paper by the author in which the dynamics and difficulties of cultural tourism in this touristic-historic city were analyzed [85].

The questionnaire was divided into 3 sections. In the first, there are questions about the respondent's residence, how long they have resided, as well as the area where they live in Toledo. Just like Krishnaswamy et al. [79], the initial condition of the respondent residing in the touristic destination for at least one year has also been taken into account. Just like Cardoso and Silva [10], this circumstance has been used to ask for how long it is that they have lived in the city. The area of residence is also asked about since the distance from the touristic center has an effect on the residents' attitudes towards tourism [60].

The second is the key section and includes 26 items, 13 about the positive impacts of tourism in Toledo and 13 about the negative ones, in which the residents must assess their degree of agreement with every item on a five-point Likert scale (where: 1 = strongly disagree, 2 = disagree, 3 = neutral, 4 = agree, and 5 = strongly agree). There are also two yes or no final questions included, asking whether the local council should control the touristic development and whether, as a resident, they consider that they can personally influence the decision-making process in regards to touristic development.

In the last section, socioeconomic and demographic information is demanded with the intention of finding out whether it is significant in their ability to point out the different opinions of the residents of tourism in Toledo. In this way, several analysis-independent variables are included. Firstly, basic demographic variables, such as gender and age, as is the standard [41,61]. It is also asked whether the resident was born in Toledo, in some other area in Spain, or abroad. Next, and following Snaith and Haley [23], it is taken into consideration whether the resident is the owner of their home and whether they reside in Toledo all year round. Then, the resident is asked whether they or someone in their family work in the tourism industry, as well as whether they think tourism in Toledo is important to their occupation. According to Krippendorf, another variable to consider is the fact that the residents are in direct contact with tourism and tourists. Thus, the citizens who work in activities closely related to tourism would have opinions differing from those that do not have such a close relationship with these activities [88]. Finally, they are asked about the residents' monthly income, given that income is another relevant factor to the residents' attitudes towards tourism [41]. In Table 1, there is a summary with all the independent variables used.


**Table 1.** Demographic and socioeconomic variables of the questionnaire sample.

The data in this study were collected between the months of October and December 2019. According to González and López-Guzmán, "convenience sampling was used, common in this type of research, where the surveyed persons are available to be surveyed in a determined space and time" [89] (p. 113). This way, the respondents were randomly chosen in the historic center as well as in the rest of the neighborhoods in the city. In order to obtain a global view of the residents' opinions in Toledo, the survey was conducted in all the areas of the city, just like Cardoso and Silva did in Porto [10]. Even though tourism is located in the historic center, the touristic-historic city, finding out about the opinion of the inhabitants of the different residential areas in Toledo, was opted on. The questionnaires were conducted by trained pollsters face to face, being the pollster the one filling in the questionnaire, or allowing the respondent to fill it in under the pollster's assistance.

The data were analyzed using descriptive methods to summarize data in a meaningful way [10]. Thus, a descriptive analysis was carried out in order to obtain a general view of the variables in the sample. The mean was used as a measurement of the central tendency, and the typical deviation was detailed in order to appreciate the importance of the variations in the answers in relation to the mean. Also, just like Tichaawa and Moyo [41], the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure of sampling adequacy and Bartlett's test of sphericity were performed to consider whether a factor analysis would be useful. When positive results were obtained, it was opted on to carry out a study on the correlations between the question items and applying the varimax rotation method, with Kaiser normalization following the example of Sharma and Dyer [61]. The socioeconomic and demographic

profiles of the respondents were entered as independent variables in multiple tests in order to investigate the potentially different opinions, which residents possess regarding the reality of tourism development following the recommendations in Ap's paper [20]. Based on the number of variable groups, the pertinent test was applied: The Student's *t*-test was performed for comparing only two groups, for example, in the case of gender, and the ANOVA in order to compare the variables in three groups, for example, in the case of income. Thus, the data analysis methodology applied by Sharma and Dyer [61] was followed and, in general, the most commonly non-parametric tests used in research about residents' attitudes to tourism [28]. However, given the diversity in the size of the sample between the groups of some of the variables, it was decided to perform a variance homogeneity test for the ANOVA test. When that test showed non-significant results (p >0.05), it was decided to perform the Kruskal-Wallis test because the variables did not show a normal distribution. Thus, another very normal statistical technique in these topic related issues was applied [28].

#### **4. Results**

The opinions and perceptions of tourism impacts on a local scale are logically variable and heterogeneous. Nevertheless, it is key to understand how local residents perceive tourism development and how their demographic characteristics and their socioeconomic context influence their opinions [16]. The opinions of Toledo's residents regarding the impacts of tourism in their city are analyzed in this section, and the experimental results of the research are displayed in two subheadings. The results are presented by analyzing the opinions of the positive dimensions and the negative aspects of tourism in the touristic-historic city of Toledo, first in a general manner and then taking into account the demographic and socioeconomic independent variables.

#### *4.1. The Residents' Opinions about Tourism Development*

The residents in Toledo have a somewhat more positive than the negative opinion on tourism development in their touristic-historic city. After analyzing the 13 items for both possibilities through a Likert scale from 0 to five, the final mean average was 3.67 for the positive opinions of tourism versus 3.49 for the negative opinions.

If we review, in the first place, the answers to the question items about positive opinions of the tourism in Toledo (see Table 2), it was observed that there was an agreement about the economic impacts of tourism. The residents thought that tourism provides with jobs (4.15) and that more tourism improves Toledo's economy (4.07). These economic benefits of tourism are acknowledged and, because of their influence, it complies with the general principle stated in the Social Exchange Theory: the residents in Toledo have a more positive than negative view of tourism, as has been pointed out. For this same reason, it is remarkable the fact that there were strong degrees of agreement in the opinions about how Toledo must increase the number of tourists who stay overnight (4.25) and increase the average stay of the tourists in the city (4.17). Achieving both goals would increase the income that tourism leaves in the city and would also solve a problem in the structural tourism development in Toledo: the excessive number of day-trippers [86]. In fact, the highest percentage of Strongly Agrees was for P8, where 53.4% of the respondents grade at a five that Toledo has to increase the number of tourists who stay overnight in the city. Among the positive opinions, a more neutral grade was obtained with the idea that tourism development improves quality of life (3.00)—"quality of life" is always somewhat broad. Residents may have different notions of the meaning of the concept of quality of life. In fact, the high standard deviation that we can see in the answers (1.31), seems to prove it—and that it improves Toledo's appearance (3.35). Therefore, there is a lower degree of agreement with the sociocultural impacts of tourism rather than economic ones. Nevertheless, the question that got the lowest mark, the sole one with disagreement, was the one related to the fact that tourism provides good employment in Toledo (2.75). The residents in Toledo acknowledge the value of tourism to create jobs in the city, but are of the opinion that they are not good jobs.



**Table 2.** Findings for residents' positive opinions on tourism development impacts. 1 Calculated by extraction communalities, which are estimates of the variance in each variable accounted for by the factors in the factor solution. 2 The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure of sampling adequacy.

When studying the dispersion of the data through standard deviation, it is in P4, the appointed question that tourism provides people with jobs in Toledo, where there is a smaller variation in answers and, therefore, a more unanimous agreement. On the contrary, where there is a wider dispersion in answers is in P7, tourism must attract more tourists; in P13, tourism development improves quality of life; in P11, tourism increases cultural and leisure activities. There is not a unanimous agreement in the assessment of the sociocultural impacts of tourism in Toledo and neither there is, in a significative way, a need for increasing the number of tourists. The stances between the residents are diverse in these concepts.

The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure of sampling adequacy and Bartlett's test of sphericity were performed on the answers obtained in the questionnaire about the positive opinions of tourism development in Toledo. The results obtained in both tests proved the usefulness of applying factor analysis to data. In the Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin test, a very high value was obtained (0.932), which clearly surpassed the 0.5 appointed as necessary for the factor analysis to be effective. When analyzing the factor loading of each question item through extraction communalities, every question surpassed 0.5, except for P2 about whether the positive benefits of tourism outweigh the negatives in Toledo, which got 0.480, in any case, a mark very close to the limit. The Bartlett's test of sphericity gave a 0.000 value, a significance level, which indicates that factor analysis can be useful with the data.

For this reason, it was decided to make a correlation matrix between the 13 items in the questionnaire about positive opinions of tourism (see Table 3). The highest values indicate that the relationship is closer. The obtained results show, in a general manner, an average correlation between the different questions. As an exception, there was a high correlation degree (0.817) between questions P8 and P9, so there is a direct relationship between the number of people that think that the number of tourists who stay overnight must be increased and those who think that the average stay should be longer. The clear link between these two questions explains the high level of correlation. The less related questions (0.270) have been P5, tourism provides Toledo with good jobs, with P9, the increase in the average stay. The residents of Toledo have a favorable opinion on the economic benefits of tourism, but consider that the tourism industry jobs are bad quality.

*Sustainability* **2019**, *11*, 3854


**Table 3.** Correlation matrix between positive question items.

Finally, factor analysis was made via an extraction method and a rotation method in order to find out the main components and to be able to approach a profile of the residents in relation to their positive opinions of tourism development in Toledo. A varimax rotation method with Kaiser normalization was applied (see Table 4). The rotation converged in three iterations and showed two main factors in the positive answers; that is to say, two groups of residents in relation to their positive opinions of tourism in Toledo: one including every opinion except for the one about how tourism creates good jobs and another, which also includes this opinion, but discards the one about how the average stay of tourists must increase.

**Table 4.** Factor analysis of positive opinions using principal component analysis and varimax rotation method with Kaiser normalization 1.


<sup>1</sup> Rotation converged in three iterations.

Regarding the residents' opinions on the negative impacts of tourism, the first question that stands out is that the variation in the distribution of the answers is greater, and the average scores are different depending on the questions (see Table 5). In fact, the standard deviation was always above one in the 13 questions about the negative impacts of tourism in Toledo. The final average score obtained was 3.49, lower than that of the positive impacts. The opinion that presents the highest level of agreement is N4, Toledo is a museum for tourists, with a 4.27 score. The host community perceives a museumification in the city. Actually, this is the question, which reached the highest percentage of top scores, and 57.2% of the respondents completely agreed with this affirmation. In addition, the residents showed a high degree of agreement with the fact that tourism in Toledo creates problems of pedestrian congestion (3.97) and that the traffic flow increments (3.91). Therefore, there is a negative opinion on the impact of tourism in the pedestrian and traffic flow in the city. On the polar opposite, the residents showed disagreement with items N11, tourism raises the crime rate (2.30), and N12, tourism affects negatively Toledo's cultural heritage (2.46). None of these negative impacts are perceived as problematic in Toledo, and they are the ones that received, percentage-wise, more minimum scores (a 27.6% of one score). On the other hand, it is especially significative that the residents do not appreciate a negative impact on the city's conservation of its heritage. Under three, although marginally, N13 opinion appears as well, that tourism reduces the use of Toledo by the residents (2.98). However, this is the question that presented a greater standard deviation (1.38), and, thus, the disagreement was strong between the respondents. Finally, it must be pointed out that in the negative impacts, there was a greater number of people who did not answer certain questions, higher than in the positive impacts. Even in items N8, tourism development raises the local tax, and N10, tourism companies are too influential politically speaking, more than 25% of the respondents did not answer, presumably thinking themselves incapable of assessing these two aspects.



**Table 5.** Findings for residents' negative opinions on tourism development impacts. 1 Calculated by extraction communalities, which are estimates of the variance in each variable accounted for by the factors in the factor solution. 2 The Kaiser-Meyer-Olkin measure of sampling adequacy.

For this reason, much like with the positive opinions, a correlation matrix of 13 items was produced (see Table 6). This time, and because of the heterogeneous answers, the correlations did not show any significant relationship. All of the values obtained were low, far from one. There were even some indirect relationships, negative ones, but also with non-significant values whatsoever. No correlations between the negative questions about the impact of tourism development in Toledo are shown.


**Table 6.** Correlation matrix between negative question items.

Also, the factor analysis with the varimax rotation method with Kaiser normalization gave more complex results than in the case of positive opinions (see Table 7). The rotation converged in six iterations and gave a result of three main factors in the answers; that is to say, three groups of residents in relation to their negative opinions on the impacts of tourism in Toledo. The first would include all the negative perceptions except for those related to the traffic and parking of vehicles and, in addition, would not consider Toledo to be a museum for tourists. The second and third detected sets would be the residents who consider some impacts to be negative, six, and seven in 13, respectively, and rule out the rest. For the second, the highest cost of tourism in Toledo would be the increase in traffic flow, and for the third, the museumification of its historic center.

**Table 7.** Factor analysis of negative opinions using principal component analysis and varimax rotation method with Kaiser normalization 1.


<sup>1</sup> Rotation converged in six iterations.

The questionnaire ended with two yes or no questions about the role that the local council should adopt in relation to tourism development as well as in relation to their own responsibility with that question. Regarding the opinion on whether the council should control tourism in Toledo, the degree of agreement was very high, with 93.7% of the respondents saying yes. It is obvious that the host community thinks that the authorities should watch over tourism in the touristic-historic city, and they are also of the opinion that it is dangerous to leave it to the market's free will. However, this responsibility is not felt like their own by the residents. On the contrary, 67.4% thought they could not influence personally the decision-making process in relation to tourism development in Toledo, against a 30.5% who answered yes and a 2.0% who did not answer at all. Despite the academicians considering the role of the host community in sustainable tourism development of the destinations to be key, the truth is that in the survey, most people who live in Toledo do not think this question affects them personally.

Ultimately, Figure 1 presents the final summary of the residents' positive and negative main opinions of the residents.

**Figure 1.** A final summary of the residents' positive and negative main opinions of the residents.

#### *4.2. The Residents' Opinions on Tourism Development According to Their Demographic and Socioeconomic Characteristics*

One of the main aims of the research was to analyze whether the residents' opinions about the touristic-historic city changed according to their demographic and socioeconomic characteristics. For this, the following were taken into account: gender, age, place of birth, length of residence, place of residence, ownership of the home, yearly length of residence, whether they were employed in the tourism industry, the importance of tourism to the occupation, and their income. According to the groups and variances of every variable, several non-parametric tests were performed, as explained in the Methods Section, in order to find out whether there were significant differences between the groups in relation to the negative and positive opinions on the impacts of tourism development in Toledo (see Table 8). The results of the different tests maintained almost constantly the null hypothesis. That is to say, there were no differences between the opinions of the different independent variable groups. In fact, in relation to the negative impacts, there were no significant differences in any case. However, in the positive opinions, some significant differences did appear: the host community had different positive opinions depending on the place of residence, the ownership of the home, the importance of tourism to the occupation, and income.


**Table 8.** ANOVA, Kruskal-Wallis test, and Student's *t*-test results: differences in opinions of tourism development according to demographic and socioeconomic characteristics.

\* *p* < 0.05. Significant difference.

In order to assess the differences between groups in the positive opinions, the descriptive statistics for each item are shown, as well as the average and the general standard deviation (see Table 9). Observing the independent variables, which had shed significant results in the tests, we conclude the following:


In the negative opinions, the non-parametric tests did not show significant differences between the groups of the demographic and socioeconomic variables analyzed. Of course, the scores obtained diverge in relation to the questions and in the whole average of the items about negative opinions (see Table 10), but not in a conclusive way so as to state that one specific element offers a more or less negative view on tourism in Toledo. Nevertheless, it is observed that there is a growing negative opinion on the impacts of tourism as age increases. Also, differences appear depending on whether they live in the historic center, with a higher average in the negative opinions, or in the residential areas; depending on whether they own the home, with a lower average in their negative opinions than the non-owners and depending on the length of residence, a higher average in the negative opinions in those who live there all year round than those who do not.







#### **5. Discussion**

There are many papers and research about the attitudes, opinions, and perceptions of the residents towards tourism development. There is a great availability of relevant work, but there are no shared and conclusive results. It is impossible to contrast the results obtained from this research with all the previous studies, given the great amount of them [28]. However, it is necessary to interpret some of the main findings with the ones obtained from previous studies.

In a general manner, our study gives a positive opinion (3.67) slightly higher than the negative (3.49), agreeing with Krishnaswamy et al.'s work about the residents in the historic city of Penang, Malaysia [79] and Cardoso and Silva's in Porto, Portugal [10]. In spite of the growth of the touristic activity in recent years [19], Toledo has not reached the limiting situation appointed by Rudsari and Gharibi that when the volume of tourists surpasses the physical capacity of tourism in a certain destination, the host community has a very negative opinion on tourism [27]. In Toledo, the residents remark the benefits of tourism development over their costs. Just like Burges [16], the limits of overtourism have not been overstepped.

Contrasting the results with Snaith and Haley's paper on York [23], research which has been the main reference point of this article for the making of the questionnaire, we have to point out that regarding the most remarkable positive opinions, they coincide in the assessment of the improvement of the economy, but not so much in the perception that they increase the cultural and leisure activities for the residents. This aspect, in the case of Toledo, gets a 3.64 score. In the main negative impacts, there is no agreement, since Snaith and Haley remarked the rise in price of the real estate and the crime rate, but in Toledo, the first aspect, even with a high score (3.78), is not among the main ones, and the question of the rise of crime is precisely the negative opinion with the lowest score.

It is commonly accepted that the economic dimension is the factor that receives the most positive attitudes from the host community. Previous studies show that this situation takes place in almost every tourist destination since tourism creates more employment opportunities and increases the income of the local economy [10,42,79,90]. The host community of Toledo complies with this regularity and considers that more tourism improves Toledo's economy. Specifically, the residents perceive the benefits generated by tourism as it raises the employment opportunities [49,61]. It happens so in Toledo, where the residents gave a score of 4.15 to the opinion that tourism creates jobs in Toledo, even though they consider those jobs not to be good. Ultimately, these aspects are repeated in relation to previous studies. The same happens with the research in Burges, where the tourism-generated income and the jobs created were the most remarkable positive aspects [16].

Regarding the negative aspects, the residents in Toledo agree anew with those in Krishnaswamy et al.'s study and have a negative evaluation of traffic congestion and pedestrian massification in the city [79]. However, while in the quoted work, the residents perceived the danger of the impacts of tourism on the heritage [79], in Toledo, they do not think it affects their cultural heritage negatively.

An agreement obtained from the yes or no questions is that the residents in Toledo, just like in Omar et al.'s paper [91], consider themselves unable to influence personally the decision-making process in regards to tourism development. Nevertheless, and as opposed to what happened in the city of Porto [10], the residents do consider it to be necessary to set limits to the future development of tourism. They think the local council is responsible for this.

Regarding the independent variables analyzed, some agreements and divergencies are observed in relation to previous studies. This way, for example, according to Huh and Voght, age contributes to changing the residents' attitudes towards tourism [92] and, in this regard, Almeida et al. point out that older population tend to show more positive attitudes towards tourism [42]. In our case, the differences in age are not statistically significant, but the exact opposite can be appreciated: as age increases, the opinions are less positive and more negative.

In relation to the place of residence, according to Andereck et al., the distance to the tourist area has no impacts on the residents' attitudes [43], but for Sharma and Dyer, the closer to it, the more negative the perception of the tourism activity by the residents [61]. This last conclusion is exactly the conclusion obtained in the research. In Toledo, the residents who live in the residential areas have a more positive opinion on tourism development than those who live in the historic center. However, in Katarzyna et al.'s work, the inhabitants of the historic center had positive opinions towards the development of tourism in the city, while those who lived in other parts of the city and very rarely got in touch with tourists expressed more negative opinions [16]. Again, contradictions in the opinions of the residents do appear, depending on the destination.

Regarding the time of residence in the touristic destination and the opinions of tourism, the researchers find contradictions: Sheldon and Abenoja state that the longer the time they have resided there, the more positive is the attitude towards tourism [63], and Almeida et al. state the opposite [42]. In the study of Toledo, no significant differences are appreciated regarding this variable, in favor or against it. In the same way, according to Lankford and Howard, the residents who were born in the tourist destination have a more critical attitude towards touristic development and do not support it completely [33], but in the present research, significant differences due to this factor are not spotted. Equally, and as opposed to Tichaawa and Moyo who state that those who do work in the tourism industry have more contrasted opinions of tourism than those who do not, in the positive as well as in the negative [41], in the host community of Toledo, this is not appreciated as relevant. Nevertheless, those who work in the tourism industry do have a higher average in negative opinions (3.76) than those who do not (3.64). According to Glasson et al., the opinions are more favorable between those who work or have family members who work in the tourism industry in Oxford [25]. This does not occur in Toledo.

It has also been remarked that the difference in income has an influence on the perceptions, especially among those who have a lower income who rated more positively the economic impacts of tourism [41,62]. In the case of Toledo, the most remarkable difference in income is the polar opposite. It is the people who make a higher income who have a more positive opinion on the impacts of tourism (4.05).

There is indeed an agreement with Snaith and Haley's work [23] in the significant fact that homeowners see tourism in a more positive way than renters, and the significant fact that those who feel tourism is important for their occupation consider it in a more positive way than those who do not feel that way. Even though in the case of Toledo, the non-parametric tests are inconclusive, there is a tendency similar to that of York in the fact that the shorter the residence, the more positive the residents' opinions of tourism are, and that those employed in the tourism industry see the impact of tourism in a more positive light. Regarding the negative impacts, Snaith and Haley [23] find several significant differences by groups, but in the host community of Toledo, the results are inconclusive.

In conclusion, the heterogeneous results obtained from the academic literature still make it necessary to carry out more research about case studies, such as the one performed here in the touristic-historic city of Toledo. Comparative analyses are also advisable between different host communities and even between different types of destinations. A future line of research by the author will follow this path, comparing the results obtained in Toledo, a cultural heritage destination, with those of a similar questionnaire conducted in a nature destination very geographically apart, in Patagonia, Argentina.

#### **6. Conclusions**

The main question asked in this research was, How do the residents of Toledo feel about the impact of tourism on their city? The host community has a somewhat more positive than negative view of tourism development in their city. The 13 positive opinions of the survey received a final average grade of 3.67 on the five-point Likert scale, while the 13 negative opinions had an average score of 3.49. If we rank the question items from highest to lowest, there are four positive opinions among the top five that have the highest grade: P8. Toledo has to increase the number of tourists that stay overnight (4.25), P9. The average stay of tourists in Toledo has to increase (4.17), P4. Tourism creates jobs in Toledo (4,15), and P1. More tourism improves Toledo's economy (4.07). On the contrary, three

of those that are among the five question items that have the worst marks, are negative: N11. Tourism raises the crime rate in Toledo (2.30), N12. Tourism negatively affects Toledo's cultural heritage (2.46), and N13. Tourism reduces the use of Toledo by the residents (2.98).

The classical Social Exchange Theory (SET) takes place, and because of the economic benefits that tourism yields for Toledo that have been acknowledged broadly in its residents' opinions—most of all in the creation of jobs (4.15), even though they think they are not good jobs (2.75)—the local population feels favorable to tourism. No tourismophobia is detected. On the contrary, the residents manifest their wish for a growing number of tourists that will stay overnight in Toledo (4.25) and whose stay will be longer (4.17), although giving the city council responsibility to control future tourism development (93.7% of the respondents). The increase in overnight stays that the residents wish for would increase the income that tourism yields in the city.

Even though the positive opinions outweigh the negative, the residents express certain derogatory opinions about the impacts of tourism on their touristic-historic city. The main one is about the growing museumification of the historic center (4.27). The other big issue that they perceive is that of the increase in traffic flow and pedestrian congestion (3.97). On the contrary, it is worth noting the fact that they do not consider tourism to negatively affect the cultural heritage or to hinder the use of Toledo by the residents (2.46).

It was also interesting to contrast how the demographic and socioeconomic characteristics influenced the residents' opinions. The main findings are that (1) the inhabitants in the historic center have a less positive view of tourism, (2) the homeowners value more highly tourism development, (3) the people who think tourism is important for their occupation have a more positive perception of this activity, abiding by the SET once again, and (4) the residents with the highest income are the ones that grant the positive impacts of tourism a higher score. Regarding the negative opinions, even though some tendencies are detected, such as that they increase with age, the statistical techniques applied show that there are no significant differences.

This research is part of the studies on the attitudes and perceptions of the host community towards tourism and, specifically, inside the studies focused on cultural tourism and, especially, in the UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Particularly, it brings comprehension of the opinions of the residents in the touristic-historic cities towards the development of the touristic activity. The methodology used in this work can be applied to historical cities with similar characteristics. It can be used in small and medium-sized cities that receive a large number of tourists and day-trippers, such as the nearby Avila or Segovia, within Spain, or many other European cities, such as Bath, United Kingdom; Carcassonne, France; Lübeck, Germany; Siena, Italy, next to other examples. The article shows potential problems for which mitigating measures can be applied. Taking action about the negative impacts perceived by the host society means raising their quality of life and improving the enjoyment of the tourist stay.

As it happens in every research, this study has limitations derived from the applied methodology itself, a questionnaire that, mandatorily, is about a sample of the residents and not its entirety. Equally and above all, in the negative opinions, it is important to remark that the answers are heterogeneous, with high values in the standard deviations. The items about negative questions, such as tourism raising the local taxes or tourism companies being too influential politically, it is worth remarking that a high number of respondents were unable to answer.

Tourism must be planned and managed in a sustainable way for the present and future generations' benefit. Getting to know the opinion of the host communities and taking them into consideration is indispensable. Finally, residents favorable to the development of tourism will give way to an atmosphere that will improve the visitor's experience.

**Funding:** This research received no external funding.

**Acknowledgments:** The researcher wants to thank his students, in the "Tourism and Heritage" course of the 4th year of the Degree in Humanities and Heritage from the School of Humanities of Toledo, for their collaboration and participation to carry out the survey under his management. The researcher also wants to thank the academicians previously interested in the topic, since it has been from them that the applied methodology has been learned. The researcher thanks Editor of *Sustainability* and the three referees for their valuable suggestions.

**Conflicts of Interest:** The author declares no conflict of interest.

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