China's glacier tourism: Potential evaluation and spatial planning

To investigate the advantages of glacier tourism resources in China and evaluate their potentials, a spatial assessment system based on an analytic hierarchy process (AHP) is established here and takes into account some of the key impacting factors on China's glacial tourism, such as location and transportation, resources and environment potential, infrastructure and development level, and socio-economic conditions. The system also evaluates glacier tourism potential based on the administrative-district level in western China using a weighted integrated method. The results show that regions with higher integrated potential indices include better traffic conditions, richer glacier resources, more robust economic and social bases, closer tourist markets, and better accessibility to glacier areas, and richer tourist resources. Reginal development strategies with higher and lower potentials are also discussed in order to improve tourism competitiveness and spatial attractions. The rich, unique glacier tourism resources, accompanying with the implementation of inter-provincial cooperation projects (for example, the Silk Road Tourist Belt, the Qing-Tibet Rail Tourist Belt, and the Shangri-la Ecotourism Zone), will lead to a stronger appeal for China's glacier tourism, for both domestic and foreign tourists.