Analysis and Leveling of Tourist Attractions in Ardebil Province

Tourism as a civilizational phenomenon is associated with numerous economic, social, cultural and environmental influences, and its prosperity and development are due to several factors such as favorable climate conditions, rich culture of nations, spectacular landscapes, utilization of communication networks, accessibility of recreation centers and, most important of all, historical works and civilizations of the past. Meanwhile, Ardabil is one of the provinces with a great potential in tourism, and the evaluation of its geographical characteristics of tourism, and its historical attractions and architecture is a step towards the development of its deprived areas. Recognition of existing tourist attractions and ranking tourist areas are the important dimensions and initial steps for tourism planning. In this research, based on library resources and field observations, in order to rank Ardebil towns in terms of tourist attractions, 19 indices have been employed in three groups of geo-tourism attractions, historical–architectural attractions, and wildlife and protected areas. Analytic hierarchy process was used to determine the indices weights, and Prometheus method was used to rank towns. Among the indices used in performing the ranking, the presence of springs and mineral springs, the most important and most influential index is considered among the indices of geo-tourism and historical–architectural. Results indicate that despite the lack of some important historical–architectural attractions, Sarein has been ranked first in the towns of the province, and Ardebil, Meshkinshahr, Namin, Parsabad, Bilehsavar, Nair, Germi, Kowsar, and Khalkhal are in the next ranks of this comparison. Finally, suggestions have been made to increase the tourist attraction by reference to the study results