Tourism promotion and the (re) functionalization of information offices: The case of Serra da Estrela

• Autor(a) principal: Roque, Vítor
• Data de Publicação: 2013
• Outros Autores: Fernandes, Gonçalo, Sardo, Anabela, Martins, José Alexandre, Melo, António
• Tipo de documento: Artigo
• Idioma: eng
• Título da fonte: Repositório Científico de Acesso Aberto de Portugal (Repositórios Cientìficos)
• Texto Completo: http://hdl.handle.net/10314/2540
• topic: Tourist Information; Tourist Information Offices; Serra da Estrela; Web 2.0.

Tourist information offices, whose mission of spreading information and supporting tourism is becoming more demanding, are under pressure to readjust in order to become structures that provide high quality information. A change from "physical access" to "digital access" is being witnessed that threatens traditional structures for the provision of information. This fact implies that the structures must be (re)functionalized in order to promote more social contact with tourists and to offer services other than the simple giving of information. This study seeks to characterize the tourist information offices of the Serra da Estrela area, to inquire about their role as providers of space in which tourists can obtain information, and to assess their skills in relation to the behaviour and requirements of tourists in the twenty-first century, namely the adaptation to new communication paradigms in tourism.