CYCLING AS AN OPPORTUNITY FOR IMPROVING HEALTH TOURISM IN İZMİR

Abstract

Izmir has been a traditional tourism destination for holiday, culture and history seekers for many years,and however the city has many advantages for some other alternative tourism options. Cycling, as one of themajor sport activities for health and a kind of special interest tourism, is getting popular among the city dwellersrecently. Convenient and long cycling routes help to meet the basic requirements of local and external bikers in theregion. The city has already been a member of the European Cycle Route Network (EuroVelo) with its projected491 km long cycle routes. The basic objective of this study is to examine the bicycle tourism as an opportunityfor local tourism. This study was designed as a qualitative descriptive research by interviewing some professionalcyclists, experts and professionals in Izmir province in order to have their ideas about the development potentialof bicycle tourism and then the effects of EuroVelo membership of Izmir. The results of the study explain that thebicycle tourism in Izmir has not sufficiently been developed yet, but the interest of local people and foreigners isstill raising and bicycle tourism has much potential for the development of local tourism.