Attractions in Destinations

An attraction is an object, person, place, or concept that draws people either geographically or through remote electronic means so that they might have experience. The experience can be recreational, spiritual, or otherwise. An attraction is an outstanding example (for whatever criteria used) of a resource which includes all the elements in a particular class. For example, the Monarch Butterfly is an attraction among the 1,000s of Lepidoptera species, the resource class of butterflies and moths, in Mexico.

Attractions in Destinations

Thousands and thousands of Mayan burial sites exist in Guatemala, yet only very few actually earn the distinction of being an attraction. Ultimately the market — not tourism experts or magazines — decide what is an attraction among its much wider resource class. If people spend time and money to experience a particular resource, then that resource is also an attraction. Traditionally, people divide up attractions between cultural and natural. Cultural should, but does not always, include historical attractions as well. Public Use Planning effort of the World Heritage Center uses another categorization, perhaps more refined, consisting of four categories:

Geophysical-landscape-aesthetic. Includes mountains, gorges, big rocks, rock formations, caves, rivers, water bodies, scenic views, overlooks of forests (when the attraction is merely seeing and not interacting more directly with the forest), unusual cloud formations, unusual meteorological conditions (high velocity or unusual wind behavior, light hitting or passing through geological formations in strange ways), thermal waters, volcanic activity, or even unusual celestial events such as the Northern Lights, Perseid Meteor Showers, or exceptionally clear night views for star-gazing.