The Tourism 'Sprawl' and Urban Changes in Rome

Being originally concentrated in the inner-city centre, tourism accommodation services have increasingly expanded in the last decades toward the semi-periphery and periphery of Rome. The tourism ‘sprawl’ is mostly the result of spontaneous decisions by firms and, partially, of deliberate urban planning strategies. Using historical data on the location of tourism attractions, hotels and other accommodation services, the research aims at analysing and interpreting the spatial distribution of tourism within the city of Rome in association with a wider set of urban changes, including suburbanization, the evolution of mobility and gentrification. The aim is to evaluate the main drives of tourism decentralization and its impact on the centre and on the periphery and, finally, on urban tourism as a human experience.