Journal of Hospitality Application & Research, BIT Mesra, Ranchi

WEB BASED TOURISM INFORMATION

SYSTEM USING GEOGRAPHICAL
INFORMATION SYSTEM (GIS) - A CASE STUDY
Mohan Lalit
Associated Consulting Engineers, Gurgaon, Haryana;
Dhawan S. C.
Centre for Computational Engineering, Punjab Engineering College, Chandigarh,
Haryana;
Krishna A. P.
Department of Remote Sensing, Birla Institute of Technology, Mesra, Ranchi.

ABSTRACT
World-wide web is fast becoming useful tool for the tourism industry
and it presents a platform that brings products and services to the
tourists. A web based tourism information system may provide on-line
brochures along with both value and services. Tourists generally want
to find objects of tourism and amenities with reference to their geographic
position and surroundings. In many cases, it is not satisfying to find
a good hotel without a reference to restaurants, sights or event locations
located nearby. This case study on web-based tourism information
system using GIS for Chandigarh city takes into account the user needs
to present the tourism objects in geographic context on interactive
tourist maps. This city is rapidly becoming a hot spot for tourists from
around the world because of its exotic locations and hospitality facilities.
In recent years, it is developing into a world class IT destination as
well. Therefore, city’s tourism sector may be promoted by global
marketing of its tourist attractions, facilities and services.

Thus, this study considers web-based GIS application towards promoting

tourism and providing an innovative way to the users to access spatial
orientation of the city. GIS content forms the core component of this
application as it provides the world wide users with spatial information
about the place that is very close to reality. This should further be
useful for supporting and planning for tourism through analysis, decision
making and management using GIS technique, and making it available
online on the internet.

Keywords: Tourism, Geographical Information System (GIS), Web-

based information, Hospitality, Global Marketing

Current issue of Journal is available at www.publishingindia.com

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1.0 INTRODUCTION

T ourism involves travel for predominantly recreational or leisure

purposes, and also refers to the provision of services in support of this
act. According to the World Tourism Organization, tourists are people who
travel to and stay in places outside their usual environment for not more
than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes not
related to the exercise of an activity remunerated from within the place
visited (WTO, 2001). Irrespective of its incident duration, tourism has
become an extremely popular global activity. Berno (1999) and Mckercher
(1996) describe the word tourism as any business like transport,
entertainment or places to stay, involved in the service of people who are
on a holiday. A tourist is an individual, who visits a place for interest or
pleasure, usually during a holiday (Mckercher, 1996).
Tourism industry involves many businesses that are directly or indirectly
involved in providing services to the tourists. Tourism is regarded as one
of the largest economic resources to a country’s revenue generation. It is
a source of foreign currency for developing countries as it involves mobility
of tourists to and from one place to another. Developing countries account
for almost 30% of world tourism revenue (Dondo et al, 2002). Tourism
has numerous tangible and intangible elements as a service industry. Major
tangible elements include transportation, accommodation and other
components of a hospitality industry. Major intangible elements relate to
the purpose or motivation for becoming a tourist such as rest, relaxation,
opportunity to meet new people and experience other cultures, or simply
to do something different and adventure. For traveling between close and
far off places, maps are required as important tools for providing precise
locations.
Over the ages, tourism has been supported by travel-books and tour-
guides. Typically, such guides include maps that are marked so as to link
description of places with their respective locations. For an average tourist,
such guides certainly serve their purpose. On the other hand, for the tourists
seeking more than just a description, typical tour guides prove unsatisfactory
(O’Looney, 2004). Internet revolution changed the way to access information
through world-wide web (www) sites of various services. Tourism sector
also uses the web technology extensively to publish web pages full of
information about the travel, tour and hospitality services. Products and
services are being offered online directly to the customers by both tourism
suppliers and tourism agencies.
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Geographic Information System (GIS) comes into picture when we talk

about the maps and its use. “Geographic information systems are used to
collect, analyze and present information describing the physical and logical
properties of the geographic world” (Goyal et al., 1997). In other words,
it deals with the collection, storage, manipulation, analysis and presentation
of spatial or geographic data. Simply put, GIS is an information system
that allows the use of spatial information effectively (Dockkey et al, 2004).
Spatial information integration, spatial analysis and spatial communication
have the potential for generating substantial new insights on new information.
Power of GIS lies in organising and manipulating spatial information by
using, both a database management system (DBMS) and an automated
cartographic system for rationally linking map features to attribute data.
It provides information in the form of a map but not just picture of a map
(Pulusani, 2001). GIS and its usefulness in various areas and applications
are well known now. Tourism is one such area where GIS is being used
to further support its services (Holm-Pedersen, 1994).
Before GIS, companies hosted a website for their business or with the
information about their products or services. Customers could get relevant
information easily over the Internet by means of accessing useful and
updated information, inquire questions, look for the tourist product
catalogues, order bookings and make payments to airlines, hotels and other
services. Despite such conveniences, users face problems with extensive
information as they have to dig down in the hyperlinks before reaching
their answers. Shneiderman (1997) refers this situation as a tragedy of the
flood of information. Therefore, web-based GIS mapping solution comes
in handy providing an interface from where the user can directly select
or query the information they need from or to the map. People can specify
their areas of interest and then look at the information described in a map.
Otherwise they can also click on the interactive informative map and get
the attribute information about the points of interest from the map database.

2.0 TOURISM AND HOSPITALITY - SIGNIFICANCE

IN INDIAN CONTEXT
Tourism in India has registered significant growth in the recent years.
In 1951, International Tourist Arrivals stood at around 17 thousand only
while the same has gone up to 3.92 million in 2005 recording earnings
of US$5731 million, a growth of 20.2% over 2004. Tourist arrivals increased
to 4.43 million in 2006, up 14.2% from 3.92 million in 2005. Foreign
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exchange earnings from tourism also grew in 2006 by 14.6% from 2005.
While the growth in tourism has been impressive, India’s share in global
tourism scenario and earnings is quite insignificant. It is an accepted fact
that India has great potential for development of tourism. World Travel and
Tourism council (WTTC) has identified India as one of the foremost
growth centers in the world in the coming decade. Tourism is the third
largest net earner of foreign exchange for the country and is also one of
the sectors employing the largest number of manpower.
In recent times, Institutes of Hotel Management continued to be the
backbone of manpower training for hospitality industry in the country.
Diploma courses offered by these Institutes were upgraded to degree
courses. The scheme of ‘Capacity Building for Service Providers’ also
continued to be implemented for providing basic skills to unorganized
sector service providers engaged in activities having direct interaction with
the tourists.

3.0 SIGNIFICANCE OF GIS IN TOURISM

Bernhardsen (1999) defines GIS as a system that captures, stores, manages,
manipulates, retrieves and analyzes geographic or spatial data through
computer hardware/software and other cartographic spatial devices to create
map products. McAdam (1999) also defines GIS in a very simple way as
a relational database that is capable of manipulating both kinds of spatial
and non-spatial data together. Spatial data is in the form of digitized maps
and non-spatial data is the attribute data in the form of alpha numeric records
associated with the spatial data. It would be appropriate to say that using
computers and other latest technologies for dealing with collecting, creating,
analyzing or manipulating the cartographic data and maps have been combined
together in a system known as GIS. This is a better tool in dealing with huge
location specific spatial and non spatial data, and therefore, easy to organize
and automate the data that can facilitate planners, officials and general public
in planning, development and marketing of tourism activity.
First step towards effective promotion and market strategies is to
computerize the tourism industry in India. Second step towards promotion
and marketing strategy for tourism is to develop user-friendly web based
GIS. As the tourism industry is vast and includes many inter-related segments,
use of GIS system is therefore classified into two categories (figure 1)
according to the user - management user and public user (Duran, et al.
2003).
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GIS in tourism

Management User Public User

Finding geographic
Planning Information of any
destination or region
Development for tour.

Marketing Finding region

specific a menities,
facilities,

Figure 1. Classification of GIS use in tourism

4.0 STUDY AREA

Figure 2. Location map of Chandigarh city

Chandigarh, the capital city of states of Punjab and Haryana is the first
planned city of India (Figure 2). It is a Union Territory, administered by
the Government of India. Le Corbusier, the famous French architect-
planner of this city conceived the master plan of Chandigarh as analogous
to a human body with a clearly defined head (capital complex), heart (city
centre), lungs (leisure valley and gardens), the limbs (cultural and educational

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institutions) and the circulatory system. Chandigarh is one of the most

significant urban planning experiments of the 20th century. It is only one
of the numerous urban planning schemes of Le Corbusier to have actually
been executed. It is as famous for its landscaping as for its architectural
ambience. Most of the buildings are in pure, geometrically subdivided form
with emphasis on proportion, scale and detail.

5.0 OBJECTIVES
Purpose of this study is to explore the role of GIS and Internet together,
in the current scenario of new and emerging technologies for the area of
tourism/hospitality; and to develop a web based tourism information system.
With the world-wide web, people have access to more information than
ever before. However, too much information from too many source cause
an information overload. Web-based GIS applications are becoming
significant in disseminating geographical information on the Internet because
of their platform independence, interactivity, and wide accessibility.
Therefore, objectives of this study are:
1. To develop a GIS enabled web-based information system prototype
that should provide the tourists with their desired information on
tourism/hospitality
2. To develop a prototype application that showcases the tourist and other
facilities of the city that should lead to promotion of tourism in the
city
3. To develop suitable query tools for the prototype system

6.0 METHODOLOGY
Figure 3 elaborates methodological steps involved in developing
Chandigarh tourism information system prototype:

Data used
i. Spatial data: Survey of India Topographical map, other collateral maps
and images of the city.
ii. Non-spatial data: Information and history about tourist attractions of
the city, services and facilities were acquired from various resources
such as tourism related websites and from other relevant agencies/
departments. Field based interviews on the user interests provided the
input in regard to the data they may be interested in when searching
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Chandigarh
tourism

Tourism
worldwide
Determining requirement of
rourism in relation to web
GIS What can be the
Web GIS contribution of GIS to
portray and promote

System prototype
architecture design

Primary data
Colletion

Spatial database design

Software installation &

configuration

Customization / Enhancement
of Mapxtreme 2005

Web
site
User interface design

Evaluation

Results

Figure 3. Methodology flow-diagram

for the tourist information. Further, the data on hotels/hospitality

industries of Chandigarh was collected from the All India Group of
Hotels. Other sources used to collect non-spatial data were internet
websites, newspapers, travel guides, tourism brochures etc.

Internet GIS - basic components

This is necessary to know the basic components involved in the Internet
GIS (Figure 4) while developing a web based GIS application.

Client

Client Web server with

application server Map Sever Data Server

Client

Figure 4. Basic component of web GIS

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1. Client - This is a typical Web interface with HTML and forms a simple
client of Internet GIS. As this type of interface possess very limited user
interactivity, as a result it is not possible for the users to interact with
the spatial objects and maps. In order to overcome this problem and
provide the user with an interface to interact with the spatial data,
alternative clients using Web add-ons were developed. These types of
alternative interactive clients include dynamic HTML and client-side
applications such as plug-ins, Java applets, and ActiveX controls (Peng
& Tsou, 2003).
2. Web server with application server - Web server and application server
constitutes the second component of the Internet GIS. A Web server is
also called as the HTTP server. The HTTP server is responsible for
replying to the requests from the clients. The Web server can reply in
several ways to the client by sending the existing HTML documents or
the map images; or by sending Java applets or ActiveX controls; or by
passing requests to and invoking other programs that can process the
inquiry. Application server receives requests from the Web server. When
the Web server receives a request that needs to be processed by some
other program, it passes the requests to the Application Server which in
turn searches for the respective applicable application program e.g. map
server and then passes on the request to process it. The application server
acts as a bridge or connector between the Web server and the map server.
3. Data server - A data server is responsible for maintaining the spatial
as well as non-spatial data in a relational or non-relational database
structures. The data server responds to the requests sent through the
SQL by a client or the map server for the required data, and thus also
called as an SQL server.
4. Map server - Map server is a major workhorse component that fulfills
spatial queries, conducts spatial analysis, and generates and delivers maps
to the client based on the user’s request (Peng & Tsou, 2003). Map server
performs the GIS functions or services such as query filtering, data extraction,
geocoding, spatial analysis, map-making, etc. Output from the map server
is either of the two forms - feature data sent to the client for manipulation
by the user or a simple map image in a graphic format. There are many
web mapping servers and image servers running around the world.
An overview of the software
MapInfo corporation’s windows software development toolkit
MapXtreme 2005 allows .NET-experienced developers to create powerful
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location-enhanced desktop and client/server applications. In support of

Microsoft’s .NET Framework for Windows, MapXtreme reflects a single
object model for developing or extending mapping applications for the
desktop, traditional client/server environments or the Web. MapXtreme is
an application development tool for data visualization and mapping for
better business decisions, management of assets and operations more
effectively. In this study, development environment tools, client side map
interaction, client side command execution, server side command
architecture and web-controls available in MapXtreme software were used.
Flow of data into the GIS database
Figure 5 illustrates different sources and the flow of data into the GIS
when developing a working database for the study:

SURVEY OF INDIA &

DEPARTMENT OF TOURISM

DIGITAL ROAD

CHANDIGARH
TRASPORT BUS ROUTS
CORPORATION
DATA
PRIMARY DATA PREPARATION

ALL INDIA GROUP HOTELS IN CITY

OF HOTELS

TOURIST ATTRACTIONS

TOURIST FACILITIES & SERVICES

INTERNET WEBSITES,
NEWSPAPER ETC
GIS DATA BASE

MINISTRY OF
TOURISM
INDIA
CHANDIGARH

Figure 5. Flow of data into GIS database

Tourism related data collected were attached with geomedia database.
This was transferred to mapinfo professional, where data were stored in .tab
files for design and interaction by viewing, editing or analyzing the
geographical data in a visual context. The other new layers were also compiled
and added according to the classification of tourism data. The new layers
were created in the form of .tab files and each attraction or facility was
represented as a point feature. Features in each layer were also categorized
according to different types available and given a category code. On the basis
of the categories the symbology was also defined in the layers.
Listed below are the sample data sets available after data processing
of GIS database in the tabular form (table 1) for application development:

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Table 1. Available data sets after data processing

S.No Data Set Type Categories Data
Format
1. Hotels Point 1. Five star Tab files
2. Four star
3. Three star
2. Other information Point 1. Beauty parlour
2. Bookstore Tab files
3. Lakes Polygon Tab files
4. Tourist places Point, 1 Gardens Tab files
polygon 2. Leisure valley
3. Open hand
monument
5. Museum Point Tab files
6. Money exchange Point 1. western union Tab files
center 2. Thomas cook
7. Restaurant Point 1. Indian Tab files
2. Chinese
3. Continental
4. South Indian
8. Cinema Point 1. Multiplex Tab files
2. Duplex
9. Information center Point 1. Tourism information Tab files
2. Others
10. Sampark centers Point 1. Jan sampark Tab files
2. Gram sampark
11. Spiritual places Point 1. Mosque Tab files
2. Temple
3. Gurudwara
4. Church
12. Post office Point Tab files
13. Police station Point Tab files
14. Rural tourism Polygon Villages Tab files
15. Medical tourism Point 1. Hospitals Tab files
2. Ayurvedic
3. Homeopathy.

Design and Implementation

GIS based project development consists of components such as data
development, data organization and application development that are not
similar but different from the standard software development projects. But
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still, there are similarities in the development process in assessing user

requirements, system requirements and other aspects of development. There
are many different methodologies of software development. The prototyping
model is one of those and provides feedback from the user during
development process rather than at the end. This enables the developer to
validate requirements and specifications before implementation of the
system which should save the resources of the project in case the result
is undesirable. Therefore, prototyping lifecycle process model is followed
to develop the web-based GIS application i.e. Explore Chandigarh.
Prototyping lifecycle process model is shown in figure 6.
Requirements
Adjustment

Requirements Contruct prototype

Analyse requirement

Execute prototype

Implementation / optimize
Customeer

Feedback Feedback
From To

Figure 6. Prototyping lifecycle process model

The key to develop a successful tourism application is to correctly
define user requirements. It is the most basic and most important part in
any study on developing a GIS tool, as each project is unique and holds
a different view of the system being developed. In the prototype model,
analyzing the requirements is one of the first activities to start developing
an application. In order to construct a web-based GIS application, necessary
components that participate in the model are client and server. A client can
be any browser which is used by a user to interact with the application.
A server consists of a web server, interface program, web GIS software
and database, which hosts the data and provides data delivery service
through request and response process to the client (Peng & Tsou, 2003).
After due customization, only the tools important to help the users in
browsing the application were placed in tool bar. This was done to
accommodate the toolbar in a single column and increase the map display
area. A list of tools with functionality is described in table 2.
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Table 2. Description of tools

S.No. Tool Name Function
1. Center Tool Allows to re-center the map by clicking on map
2. Distance Tool Allows to get the distance between two or more
points by clicking on the map
3 Navigation Tool Allow to pan the map by fixed directions: North,
South, East, West, Northeast, Northwest, Southeast
and Southwest
4. Pan Tool Pan Tool allows to reposition the map within its
window by dragging in any direction
5. Point Selection Tool Allows to select a feature (nearest to the point) when
clicked on the map
6. Polygon Selection Tool Allows selection of such features whose centroids lie
within the polygon. Polygon is drawn on the map
using mouse clicks representing nodes of the polygon
7. Rectangle Selection Tool Allows selection of all features whose centroids lie
within the rectangle. The rectangle is drawn on the
map using mouse clicks representing opposite corners
8. Zoom Bar Tool Allows zooming of a map to a series of preset levels
9. Zoom In Tool Allows drawing of rectangle representing the view
to zoom in on the map
10. Info Tool Sample Allows retrieval and display of information for
Web Application a feature by selecting feature on the screen, by sending
requests using JavaScript to a server without having
to refresh the entire page

7.0 RESULTS AND DISCUSSION

This study has attempted to develop an accessible Web GIS prototype,
through which the spatial information related to the tourism of Chandigarh
city tourism information thus can be dissipated to the world-wide users.
Figure 7 shows enhanced user interface as developed in this ptototype.
Similarly, figures 8(a), (b) and (c) illustrate map navigation functions such
as zoom in, zoom out and distance measurements. Example of search
function of this prototype is depicted in figure 9.
This integrated online tourist information system can help the tourists
from far destinations to explore city tourist activities and decide their tour
in an appropriate manner by performing on-line GIS queries, analysis and
‘what-if’ scenarios.
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Figure 7. Different parts of Chandigarh in an enhanced interface

Figure 8(a). Zoom in function

Figure 8(b). Zoom out function

Figure 8(c). Distance measurement

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Figure 9. Search for a restaurant of choice

8.0 CONCLUSIONS
Web GIS based tourism information system prototype should be useful
as online interactive guide for the tourists. This is capable of providing both
spatial and non-spatial tourism information. Customization carried out
should also allow enhancements with added functionalities of finding a
location through queries, hyperlinking the features and proximity search.
This Web GIS based application can assist the prospective domestic and
foreign tourists to the city in advance planning of their tour in time and
with greater spatial details at their disposal. Similarly, tourism related
departments, agencies, hospitality industries and other services should also
benefit in terms of being able to participate in the global marketing of their
tourism products and services. However, this will be appropriate to enumerate
the advantages and limitations of this prototype web GIS based tourist
information system. Advantages foreseen are as follows:
● This application should enable even naive users who are not familiar
with GIS to browse the tourism spatial content through Web over the
Internet.
● This application should help the tourists in making adequate
arrangements before finalizing and undertaking the tour.
● This application should improve the quality and level of web information.
● This should serve as a utility for the public user as well as a marketing
tool for the city tourism management to promote and attract tourists.
● Data can be periodically updated and maintained in real time and space.
There are certain limitations as well with the GIS data involved in the
application and the prototype application. These are:
● Technical barrier in the regions with low Internet access speeds. In
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major parts of India, an average Internet speed is 56 Kbps, which is

a great hindrance for the people in accessing this application.
● Much of the processing is done at the server side and thus, the network
has more requests and responses which may result in longer response
times.

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Department of Hotel Management, BIT-Mesra, Ranchi-835215