Western societies have traditionally differentiated work from leisure; for some of us they are direct opposites, toil and fun. Spare time essentially entails freedom, the individual's opportunity for self-expression. Yet like work, leisure has also been subjected to control from above, included obligatory activities. Finnish peasants were obliged to go to church every Sunday; and until quite recently, the Finns have been patronised by the state in a number of ways with regard to their spare time, including their sex life, going out, dancing, and the use of recreational stimulants. Today, in the era of individualism, patronage and control over citizens' private life are being reduced. But with official bodies and general norms giving up control over individuals' free time, market forces are entering the stage, trying to gain control.
It is no trivial matter how the Western individual chooses to spend his or her leisure time. Egoistic hedonism and curiosity can be satisfied in a myriad different ways. Doing things and going places can provide a person not only with knowledge and experiences but also with status. In the space of a few decades, we have turned the globe into a huge playground, a bazaar full of new thrills and exciting possibilities.
Mass Tourism - Heaven or Hell?
During the agrarian era, it was commonplace never to leave one's birthplace, and information from the surrounding world was scarce. Travel remained the privilege of a small elite until the 1960s, when it became a mass activity throughout the Western world. The change was facilitated by the rise in the standard of living, urbanisation, increasing free time, and travel advertising.
With a great number of people in the industrialised countries constantly on the move, travelling from one place to another, we have entered a new, strange era in the history of humanity, something we might call contemporary global nomadism. Tourism is becoming the largest industry in the world, with important consequences. Westerners roaming the world is now a mass phenomenon, a special sector of consumerism, with implications for various unique destinations of great natural beauty around the globe. Willingly or unwillingly, tourism has transformed the original building stock, new construction, land use, natural surroundings, and landscapes, as well as the culture and livelihoods of the people to suit its needs. Cultural influences intertwine, and the concepts of the authentic and the unauthentic converge.
"Hello, mister, where are you from..."
If authorities and experts fail to control the tourist industry, it is at its worst capable of destroying valuable cultures and natural and built environments in a very short space. In developing countries tourism has been given a particularly free hand. It is controversial that mass tourism at its worst should destroy or damage the very sights on which tourism in the region was based in the first place. Later on, copies and replications may be offered to replace the lost originals.
In northern Thailand, villages of ethnic mountain tribes are being opened as exotic sights, to which guides bring larger and larger numbers of Western tourists. As in many other new tourist resorts, tourism also brings roads, airports, and hotel areas, rapidly transforming indigenous cultures and livelihoods. In Pamukkale, Turkey, the ancient ruins of the Hierapolis temple have been replaced by casinos, hotels, and parking lots needed by spa visitors. In Egypt, the monuments of the pharaohs have been subjected to major restoration, while the built environment deriving from the Middle Ages and later centuries has often been left to its own devices, at the mercy of speculators. A good example is a small island in the Nile in Assuan, occupied by ancient temple ruins and a village from the Middle Ages and the most famous sight of the town since the 19th century: the island is now also host to a huge skyscraper hotel, the highest building in the town. The next mega hotel has already been completed, and it remains to be seen whether there will be anything left of the culture of the island. Another problem is the somewhat overzealous restoration of sites, as in China where monuments have been redeveloped rather than restored like the Temple of Heaven in Beijing.
Dining in Torremolinos? Pizza Hut and McDonald's!
The problems of industrialised countries are similar to those of developing countries. Take the Costa del Sol in Spain: it used to be famous for its pictoresque fishing villages and white houses terraced along the slopes; now it has changed into a cramped, overbuilt tourist slum favoured by criminals and filled with pollution, no longer attracting the wealthier type of tourist. In Italy there are plenty of cultural heritage sites attracting masses of tourists, but lacking adequate attention: the frescoes excavated in Pompeii, for example, have in the course of time deteriorated from lack of care. Many cultural monuments in Italy, such as Villa d'Este in Tivoli, have been spoiled by graffiti from the hands of tourists. Yellowstone, the world's first national park, is on the hazard list of UNESCO's World Heritage sights because of a major mining project, waste problems, and the construction of new roads, not to mention the pressures imposed by the tourist industry. There are plenty of examples like these around the globe.
Sometimes industrialised countries have taken brave steps to curb mass tourism. An extreme example is the villa and garden of Katsura in Japan, which only a handful of guided groups are being allowed to visit. The tourism policy in Iceland is a positive example of profilisation towards sustainable nature tourism, a delicate use of a nation's own land.
From Lapland Inns to Tourist Towns
In Finland, mass tourism has rarely been a problem; some sites of cultural tourism have suffered more from the low numbers of visitors. Yet in Lapland there are many dubious cases related to sites of traditional nature tourism.
The history of tourism in Lapland presents a typical example of the regional life cycle of tourism. Foreign adventurers and tourists began to rove Lapland in the 18th century. Tourist resorts adjacent to national landscapes have been built since the late 19th century to cater for the upper classes wishing to admire the wilderness. The inns and hotels were well designed, details included. From the 1920s onwards, Lapland became the top destination for tourism in the whole of Finland. Until the 1960s, it was the state that designed and financed most buildings for the use of tourism. The heroic era of tourism in Lapland was part of the international movement of classical tourism.
In the 1960s, tourism in Lapland became increasingly middle-class, and activity tourism became central, downhill skiing in particular. Designs were prepared for large tourist towns. On all levels of planning, the authorities have been unable to control construction engendered by downhill skiing, be it at regional, master or site level. Consequently, natural preservation areas and well-known landscape sites have suffered. I shall next discuss some examples.
National Park as Construction Site
The Pyhätunturi Fell in Pelkosenniemi is an ancient Sami shrine and a national landscape famous for its natural beauty. The idea of a national park was proposed in the early 20th century, becoming reality in 1938. Yet by 1991 the government had had a change of heart: part of the dome of the fell, an important part of the national park, was sold for a million Finnmarks to the municipality, which then leased it to a private company intending to build lifts, slopes, and a serpentine road. By the present day, 37,200 beds have been planned for the tourist resort of Pyhä-Luosto. There is no feasible, well-advised overall plan: the project is all about maximising profit. Burdening a traditional national park with a tourist resort of this capacity creates an immoderate disharmony with the site's traditional identity based on nature and cultural tourism. The standard of facilities of the Pyhä-Luosto apartments and cottages is higher than in housing in general, but the standard of design and appreciation of the surroundings are generally inferior.
Next to the Pyhä-Luosto tourist resort lies the village of Suvanto, which until recently was a rare example representing the village culture of Southern Lapland. Its Classicist timber buildings were documented and renovated with devotion. Once shortlisted for inclusion on UNESCO's World Heritage list, the village was destroyed within a couple of years. A large concrete bridge, the waterfront turned into a power plant pool, and ill-advised new construction faded the authenticity. The tourist industry, too, became interested in Suvanto. Late in 1989, construction began on an 18-hole Santa Claus golf course; even the National Board of Antiquities finally cheapened itself to back the project. After clearing the site and completing the earthworks, the golf entrepreneur went bankrupt; it still remains unclear who will pay for at least an adequate landscaping of the the ugly clearance and the gravel heaps by the side of the village. And next, re-enter the Finnish National Road Administration, covering the old village street with asphalt and turning it into a standard road.
The village of Suvanto was a pearl, broken in ignorant hands. It is a good example of the lack of policies for cultural tourism and tourism complying with the principles of sustainable development in Finland. Sites suited for cultural tourism should be marketed on the basis of their historical value, instead of putting up theme parks. The role of architects and authorities should not be limited to conservation; the planning of tourism suited to the site and appropriate marketing strategies should be part of the job from the very start.
The Rise and Fall of Ylläs
The rugged Yllästunturi Fell in Kolari is a famous landscape site as well as an ancient sacred place of the Sami. It has been rapidly transformed into a vast tourist resort. Today, it is the largest downhill skiing centre in the Arctic area of Scandinavia, with its 18 lifts and 33 ski slopes. The slopes, lifts, and artificial snowing systems were built in a natural preservation area owned by Metsähallitus, the National Forest and Park Services. The instructions of landscape management stated in the lease were followed until 1991, when the stunted, lichen-covered fell slopes were suddenly turned upside down and worked with machines, drastically violating the instructions. The massive earthworks were carried out in order to lengthen the skiing season, for artificial snow requires a smooth surface. Next year saw the construction of more lifts and snowing machinery on the sadly destroyed fell slopes, with the Ministry of Labour supporting the project to the tune of 3.7 million Finnmarks. The ruined slopes of Yllästunturi can be seen from dozens of kilometres away. Before the lift company went bankrupt, it suggested that the churned slopes be coloured with chemicals. Attempts have been made to improve the tampered landscapes by turning the stones back by hand, again with the gracious support of the Ministry of Labour. Yet it will take hundreds of years for the landscape to recover with lichen growing back on the slopes.
Famous for its 19th-century vernacular building which survived the War of Lapland, the village of Äkäslompolo has not suffered only from uncontrolled construction but also from ignorant attitudes towards the old building stock, including even demolition. The traditional Southern Lapland cultural landscape has been breached and replaced by consumerist construction catering to the needs of the tourist industry, providing new thrills and experiences. As in other tourist resorts in Lapland, many an extravagant project here has been financially supported by the Ministry of Trade and Industry with its special funds for development areas and tourism. The policy of the Ministry of Trade and Industry does not include evaluating the quality of the architecture or the environmental aspects. Architects have been employed in the design of the area in a precious few cases. According to the new general plan, the area will provide 30,000 beds in the future. The proposal for a general plan also included opening a 2-3-kilometre-long vehicle tunnel into the side of the fell, with access to various underground facilities including an ice rink, sports hall, congress centre, amusement arcade, workshop, restaurant, shopping mall, civil defence centre, and parking cavern. The top of the fell was to be occupied by a hotel partially excavated into the fell, and cottages. In addition, the proposal included 15 hotels, a spa, a golf course, 70-80 ski slopes, and 36 ski lifts. Despite the fact that the landscape and environment investigations conducted by the Ministry of the Environment were completely ignored in the proposed plan, the Ministry swallowed it almost without reaction, except for the tunnel. The decision dating from 1953 to save the area as a natural preservation area is in practice forgotten.
Santa Claus Fairyland
On visiting the town of Rovaniemi, old travel guides commended the tourist to climb to the top of Ounasvaara to admire the views over the river valley. Today, tourism is focused around the Arctic Circle, in Santa's own shopping centre. Tourists are lured into the centre by an American-style Santa Claus, fake Sami people, and phoney traditional huts. In 1997 this tourist attraction for motorists was provided with a Santa Claus fairytale castle, a Romantic timber building designed by a local engineer and financially supported by the European Union and the Ministry of Trade and Industry. Arctia Ltd, then a subsidiary of ALKO (the state-owned alcohol monopoly), opened a restaurant, aptly named Café Strindberg. The most recent project planned in the Arctic Circle is Santapark, the number one tourist project in the whole of Finland. The design will mainly be carried out by British set designers. Local history - the centuries-old vernacular tradition of Southern Lapland, with its handsome timber buildings - has been forgotten. In the town centre there are now huts made of round logs and other out-of-place constructions. Lapland has truly arrived at Rovaniemi, whose own tradition is North Ostrobothnian; Lapland clichés obviously sell better than genuine tradition and indigenous features. Tourists who take a day-trip to Rovaniemi by Concorde will not see the Empire-style peasant houses of the region; instead, they are taken to shacks erected in the bushes near the airport. Rovaniemi, which calls itself the town of Alvar Aalto and Santa Claus, has made an appeal to the Supreme Administrative Court because the Ministry of the Environment refused to approve a plan alteration making way for a 16-storey Hotel Santa Claus. The tower was to serve as the new attraction for a town losing its integrity.
The latest tourist trend in Lapland seems to be oversized accommodation facilities and huge hotels that can be seen from miles away. An example is the 15-storey mega hotel of 67,000 m2, planned for the top of Koutalaki Fell adjacent to Levi Fell in Kittilä.
The examples listed above are ubiquitous: the evolution of mass tourism seems to follow the same pattern everywhere. Looking at the state of natural landscapes only, we can see that the UNESCO World Heritage list alone includes several sites which are endangered on a constant basis: sometimes they are threatened by new airports, sometimes by new mines, and so on. There are model cases of tourism both in Lapland and around the world, but examples such as those listed above will be more and more commonplace with the numbers of tourists increasing around the world.
Cultural Tourism Requires
Expertise and Planning
Tourism should not be allowed to operate on shortsighted conditions. Golf courses, tropical spas, theme parks, dinosaurlands, and tower hotels, or fells ruined with ski slopes and lifts, are hardly the primary sights to attract tourists to Finland. The value of culture, the environment, and landscapes, as well as local features, should be taken into account when tourism and tourism-related architecture are being planned.
In order to protect valuable sites, UNESCO and ICOMOS, serving as its expert body, have compiled a set of rules and principles concerning tourism at monuments of cultural historical value and natural landscapes.1 Global tourism and its accumulative consequences have been critically discussed in recent years, and attempts have been made to make tourism 'softer', more ecological. Even entrepreneurs have become more aware of the problems of mass tourism. At some resorts entrepreneurs have cooperated with the authorities in order to improve the environment of damaged sites that have been turned into slums, as in the Canary Isles.
Tourism planned and supervised with expertise will not harass our cultural and natural heritage: at best, they can support each other. If the profits of tourism are sensibly channeled, they can help safeguard the sites and the landscapes. Tourist resorts and tourist routes and their relationship to natural preservation areas should be re-defined and re-categorised on a regional level. Suitable resorts may be fit to house even large numbers of tourists and activity tourism, while the use of significant natural conservation areas and cultural landscapes must be controlled and protected with shield zones. Architects are needed in designing cultural tourism, but it is absolutely necessary that authorities rediscover their proper role.
Finland and her provinces should be provided with an intelligent, refined tourism strategy, which would prevent us from any passing fancies with fashionable trends of activity tourism. The era of classical tourism, based on the valuing of tradition, nature, and cultural landscapes, is clearly at hand.
Harri Hautajärvi
