Space–time tourist flow patterns in community-based tourism: an application of the empirical orthogonal function to Wi-Fi data

Luning Li, Xiang Chen, Luyun Zhang, Qiang Li, Yang Yang and Jin Chen

Current Issues in Tourism, 2023, vol. 26, issue 18, 3004-3022

Abstract: Community-based tourism is a sustainable form of tourism development where tourists visit residential communities to interact with local lives and cultures for an enhanced travel experience. Identifying and tracking tourist activities in community-based tourism is particularly challenging, as tourists have shared activity spaces with residents. The paper proposes a new method to study the space–time patterns of the tourist flow using Wi-Fi data. Specifically, we have tracked Wi-Fi probe requests over six months in the Shichahai scenic area, a famous community-based tourist attraction in Beijing, China. After deriving the tourist flow from the Wi-Fi data, we have applied the empirical orthogonal function (EOF) method to the identification of the spatial aggregation pattern and the temporality of the tourist flow. A follow-up explanatory analysis examines the environmental impacts, such as weather conditions, air quality, and travel days, on the space–time patterns. The study is among the first to employ Wi-Fi data to study travel behaviours in community-based tourism. The proposed method can shed insights into a better understanding of tourist behaviours in open-space, tourism-oriented urban communities.

Date: 2023
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DOI: 10.1080/13683500.2022.2106826

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