Overview
The movement of people, goods and information has accelerated considerably in the recent decades. The need to explain these processes is becoming increasingly important, and therefore requires new research methods.
The aim of this research programme is to clarify the main patterns of space-time mobility of the population in Estonia and how different personal and environmental characteristics influence these patterns.
The project studies effects of population mobility and migration on the development of Estonian cities, regions and on the environment.
The research will employ the traditional methods of migration studies, and innovative methods such as mobile positioning and environmental monitoring. The research team includes experienced geographers from different sub disciplines who have demonstrated a capability to run interdisciplinary research projects in population mobility and environmental impacts. A laboratory of mobile positioning and urban environment has been established.
Funding
Results
The results have been published in this paper:
http://www.emeraldinsight.com/doi/full/10.1108/17465261111168000
In the empirical part of the project, the results clearly indicate to the high potential of the use of the PMP method in order to improve the quality of data about tourism flows in Estonia. The PMP method enables to observe and measure the duration, timing, density, seasonality and dynamics of visitations. Moreover, it allows also distinguishing repeat visitors. Repeat visitors could be segmented by their countries of origin, frequency of visitation, seasonality, etc. In addition, the local destinations and events most loved by repeat visitors and their movement trajectories could be identified. The diverse dataset provided by the PMP allows implementing the more detailed classification of segments of repeat visitors proposed by us.
The use of the PMP method provides prerequisites for creating the new focus in destination marketing of the country. The Estonian Government could diversify its tourism strategy by addressing multiple segments of repeat visitors. Even if the aim of the Estonian tourism policy has been to extend the duration of the repeat visits, it was impossible to measure the outcome of the policy so far. Consequently, it was also impossible to set clear tactical goals as to how to target different segments of repeat visitors. The PMP method could be used as a tool to obtain valuable feedback information and, therefore, implement more specific tactics to extend the duration of repeat visits of multiple segments of visitors.