L'immagine di Firenze fra esperienza turistica e qualità urbana

This article deals with the image of Florence as perceived by foreign tourists. The main goal is to investigate whether mass tourism is deteriorating the image of the city as seen by upper levels of touristic demand and therefore affecting its destination positioning. The study is based on both qualitative and quantitative empirical investigations conducted on tourists hosted in 4 and 5 star hotels and by persons studying or working in prestigious research institutes in Florence. Alltogether 900 English, German, Spanish and French mother tongue visitors were interviewed. The investigation results show an ongoing erosion of the city image and a clear relation between the length of stay and image erosion, with a quick decline after the first week lasting for about one month. Moreover, the study illustrates that urban quality influences the perception of long term tourists more than the historical and monumental heritage of the city does. The article concludes suggesting some political measures to improve the city image for qualitative tourism. Altre informazioni: L’articolo costituisce il contributo dell’autrice al convegno internazionale “Quale turismo per Firenze? Esperienze internazionali a confronto”, tenutosi a Firenze il 19.12.2008, organizzato dall’autrice in collaborazione con l’Università di Monaco di Baviera.