Strategic management in the tourism industry Essay

Strategic management in the tourism industry - Essay Example However other airports in London like Heathrow and Gatwick which have a much wider passenger base have much more advanced communication systems built by the likes of Siemens. (Businesswire, 2001). Another strength that is available to Luton over all other airports is its geographic location. It is situated in London which is not only the centre for business in the UK, but also one of the major tourist attractions that is offered by the European Union. People who are either on vacations or on business tend to visit London throughout the year. Therefore the number of passengers arriving in London based airports is fixed and sees a constant gradual increase every other year. But considering in London, there are four other airports, Luton strives to compete with the traffic generated throughout London (Greater and the City). Each of these airports caters to a different market and a different geographic segment thus each airport remains competitive and unique. The airport boasts of having a spacious parking lot where passengers can leave their automobiles over short or long periods of time. The valet parking system frees the owners of having to find their own parking space and provides the assurance of security to the owners who can have peace of mind while they are on their trip. In comparison, Heathrow and Gatwick which caters to a much higher number of passengers and parking area is unable to accommodate passengers who want to leave their cars in walking distance from the airport. (Luton-Airport, 2008) Another major strength of Luton airport which can be noted is the number of destinations which Luton airport passengers get to go to. Luton airport forwards passengers to 85 destinations worldwide. Being the 5th largest airport in UK, its passenger base has been increasing by 5% for a few years now. Compared to Gatwick's growth by 2.5% and Stansted's growth by 10%, one can say that Luton's growth has been average yet steady. Weaknesses of Luton Airport Due to the fore mentioned strengths, Luton has a large passenger turnover rate. Thus more passengers equate to more luggage and baggage being brought into and sent out of the airport. The sheer amount of baggage being transferred results in quite a few cases of lost baggage over time. Luton does not yet have sufficient resources to fully manage the problem of the handling of luggage and is facing problems in this regard. But even with the best technology and hi-fi RFID systems implemented by Heathrow airport to track the luggage, the first day at the opening of the new Terminal 5 saw a great deal of problems. In

The Rule of Proximity Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2750 words

The Rule of Proximity - Essay Example Some of these features or news values (Kim, 2001) may be intrinsic to the event or they may be extrinsic. Intrinsic values may be prominence or importance, degree of human interest evoked, degree of conflict or controversy involved and degree of the unusual implicated (Kim, 2001). Extrinsic values may be timeliness and proximity of the event to the location at which the media will be operational (Kim, 2001). It is notable, though, that the intrinsic values can also be correlated to the media location since it is observable that values like prominence or importance, capability to evoke human interest, degree of conflict or controversy and degree of the unusual all depend to some extent upon how the population at the media location usually relate to the population at the event location. This is so because researchers have also observed that events at a particular location, when it is judged for newsworthiness at a location in another country, are usually influenced much by the social, political, economic and geographic perspectives the media country holds of the event country (Kim, 2001). Thus, the newsworthiness of an event in any country, when judged in relation to media in the United States, will depend much upon the political relevance the U.S.A. places upon the event country (Kim, 2001). It will also depend much upon the degree of threat or benefit that event has for the U.S.A. and the World at large (Kim, 2001). These latter observations have great relevance to this paper since it is already manifested from these that the rule of proximity as well as other news values has much in common with values that influence diplomatic relationships between and among countries. Globalisation: There is one factor in the present world scene that does to a great extent override relationships among geographically and culturally proximal nations. While the paper finds that geographical and cultural proximity has been considered as an indicator of levels of diplomatic activities it also realises that it must also consider aspects of globalisation, the modern worldwide phenomenon that is expected to provide collective effort towards globally invasive problems like disarmament, arms regulations, combating international terrorism, cross-border crime and the drug trade and usage, protection of human rights, prevention of climate change and desertification, promotion of sustainable development, conflict prevention and development assistance and cooperation, peacemaking and keeping and foreign trade (Sucharipa, Undated). In this context it is very likely that national proximity is not the only overriding factor for strengthening diplomatic ties among nations. Nor is it likely that co nflict among nations in geographic proximity will remain contained within that region without effort from the global community towards it speedy amelioration. Thus, in this sense, it is observed that geographic and cultural proximity is not considered as important an indicator of political will as it was a few years earlier. Instead, it is again observed that national foreign policy is not contained to outside the country by the gatekeeper functional and kept apart from its domestic one. This is because other departments of the nation, such as the environmental one, may need direct contact with international agencies without having to seek permission of the foreign policy makers (Sucharipa, Undat