Mega‐events tourism legacies: the case of the Torino 2006 Winter Olympic Games – a territorialisation approach

Abstract

This paper examines the impact of mega‐events such as the Olympic Games on tourism development in host territories. In the first part, we adopt a territorialisation approach to understand the relationship between the event and the host region. A mega‐event is conceived as a great chance to generate new territory as it produces both tangible and intangible legacies that remain after the event ends: renewal of facilities for hospitality and accommodation, better infrastructures, better training for people in the tourism business, and improvement in international visibility. These legacies can represent a platform for future tourism development if local policies demonstrate the ability to re‐territorialise a mega‐event’s temporary transforming effects on tourism into long‐lasting ones. The paper then focuses on the case of Torino 2006. Moving from an overview to recent tourism data, some considerations of the post‐event trends in the Olympic territory are proposed. Thus, the paper highlights several critical aspects for a re‐territorialisation of the Olympic legacies and for tourism policies that can sustain the positive effects of the event over the long term.

Keywords:

• Olympic legacy
• tourism
• territorialisation approach
• Torino 2006

Notes

1. The OMERO research group (http://www.omero.unito.it) was created in 2003 as an interdisciplinary research centre (consisting of geographers, economists, political scientists and sociologists) that conducts surveys and organises scientific initiatives on the theme of the Olympic Games and mega‐events in general. The main publications of the centre include Bobbio and Guala (2002), Segre and Scamuzzi (2004), Bondonio, Dansero, and Mela (2006) and Bondonio, Dansero, Guala, Mela, and Scamuzzi (2007).

2. The territorialisation perspective is mostly diffused in French and Italian geography. In Anglo‐Saxon studies, the term is also sometimes adopted in economic geography, but with different meanings. As an example, Storper (2000, p. 43) defines territorialisation as an ‘economic activity that is dependent on territorially specific resources (…). An activity is fully territorialised when its economic viability is rooted in assets (including human practices and relations) that are not available in many other places and cannot easily or rapidly be created or imitated in places that lack them’.

3. This trend is shared with other cities that have hosted the Winter Olympics, including Salt Lake City (Circolo L’Eau Vive – Comitato Giorgio Rota, 2007).

4. The data for 2006 include both ‘event’ tourists and those who decided to visit the city after the Olympics. In the case of Torino, the two flows may have overlapped to some extent.

5. Based on a campaign of interviews with insiders, conducted during the spring of 2007 (see Dansero & Mela, 2007).

6. The figures show a sharp drop in arrivals and presences of foreign tourists in the city of Torino. This, however, is not the case for the metropolitan area, where the decrease in foreign tourists has been less pronounced and the overall numbers – of both foreign and Italian tourists – have risen.

7. In the case of Barcelona, for example, we can mention the number of visitors (over 1.5 million each year) who visit the local museum district, which is home to the Olympic stadium and museum, and the Barcelona football club’s Camp Nou stadium.

8. Looking at the ‘vacation tourism’ cluster in greater detail, the main activities mentioned by the sample included tours of the city, visits to the monuments and museums in the city and, to a lesser extent, in its surroundings, shopping and food and wine‐related interests.