IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/touman/v31y2010i6p838-845.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Steps to Space; opportunities for astrotourism

Author

Listed:
  • Cater, Carl Iain

Abstract

Recent years have seen the emergence of the astrotourist following the $20 million trip by Dennis Tito to the International Space Station (ISS) in 2001. Although this is the preserve of the hyper-elite, within the next decade it is likely that there will be more affordable opportunities on sub-orbital reusable vehicles pioneered by the Virgin group. This paper offers an overview of recent developments in the space tourism industry as a whole and offers definitions for the new sector of astrotourism. Drawing on motivational theory, the study examines the motivations and experiences that astrotourists have demonstrated through interviews reported through the media. However, parallels are demonstrated with the existing terrestrial space tourism industry, which has been largely ignored to date. Consequently the paper also examines the management of these sites and the challenges this niche presents. There is also evidence of a travel career being marketed by space tourism travel agents, dubbed by one interviewee as ‘steps to space’. This builds on potential tourists' existing aspirations for space experiences allied to these companies' credentials in adventure tourism. Whilst sharing parallels to the work of Pearce (1982), the focus of this career on one particular theme is of interest. This theoretical bridging is useful for observing tourism organisations at work, and furthermore uncovers the massive potential that developments in space tourism present for the tourism industry as a whole.

Suggested Citation

  • Cater, Carl Iain, 2010. "Steps to Space; opportunities for astrotourism," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 31(6), pages 838-845.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:touman:v:31:y:2010:i:6:p:838-845
    DOI: 10.1016/j.tourman.2009.09.001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0261517709001666
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.tourman.2009.09.001?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Martina Pásková & Nicol Budinská & Josef Zelenka, 2021. "Astrotourism–Exceeding Limits of the Earth and Tourism Definitions?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(1), pages 1-25, January.
    2. Reddy, Maharaj Vijay & Nica, Mirela & Wilkes, Keith, 2012. "Space tourism: Research recommendations for the future of the industry and perspectives of potential participants," Tourism Management, Elsevier, vol. 33(5), pages 1093-1102.
    3. Dajana Bjelajac & Bojan Đerčan & Sanja Kovačić, 2021. "Dark skies and dark screens as a precondition for astronomy tourism and general well-being," Information Technology & Tourism, Springer, vol. 23(1), pages 19-43, March.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:touman:v:31:y:2010:i:6:p:838-845. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.elsevier.com/tourism-management .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.