5 Ways COIMBRA ST LLM is packing the central region of Portugal for being a welcoming, sustainable and smart destination

From the visitor perspective, travelling offers joy and responsibility. Finding low-impact accommodations and sustainable transport is challenging. Major booking platforms provide an endless offer of options, but lack the transparency to differentiate between sprawling hotel chains or privately owned rooms that alter the social and economic fabric of specific quartiers, and locally owned guest houses that might contribute more directly to the community and avoid negative impacts. The seamlessness with which we can book accommodations and find dining options online creates a perception of endless availability, masking the potential burden on local communities and infrastructure. Even well-intentioned travellers lack the fundamental tools and information to make truly informed and sustainable choices. Planning should be an accessible and intuitive aspect of the travel experience.

Even more important is to find ways to empower travellers to be aware participants rather than passive consumers of a destination. Shifting the focus from the tourist's perspective to the resident's needs is crucial for fostering sustainable urban development. Currently, the dominant narrative often suggests that any destination is within reach, irrespective of the impact on local communities. The goal is to cultivate more authentic visitor experiences, encourage longer, more immersive stays, and work on making the residents the main target group of the local policies and strategies, which will in turn foster positive impacts on the tourism sector to ensure more accessible destinations, starting with innovative approaches to mobility, waste management and heritage preservation.

Situated in the centre of Portugal, along the banks of the Mondego River, lies Coimbra, a city steeped in history and academic tradition. For centuries, its respected university, recognised as UNESCO World Heritage Site, has been essential for the city, shaping its identity and cultural landscape. Now, Coimbra is embracing innovation while caring for its rich tangible and intangible heritage as a catalyst for a future vision. Despite the considerable number of visitors (over half a million visitors per year), Coimbra holds on to its authenticity: it's not uncommon to be stopped by students dressed in their traditional clothes playing fado and describing the city’s heritage, or to enjoy a break in a local pastry shop surrounded by both residents and tourists. This atmosphere, however, exists within a context of urban transformation, evidenced by the numerous renovations with new and diverse functionalities aligned towards a more circular city, such as the transformative urban waste management policy, or the new sustainable mobility project Metrobus, intended to connect the city itself, and the surrounding natural landscape.

Recently, in response to tourism dynamics, the municipality of Coimbra has also launched a dedicated strategic plan which, together with the project funded by the European Urban Initiative, will mitigate pressures and negative impacts linked to UNESCO designation and over-tourism. Solutions like sustainability certifications, data-driven tools, and skills development will prove crucial both to increase tourist awareness regarding the fragility of the heritage and to foster training and effective collaboration between public and private organizations. These kinds of pioneering strategies have been launched to foster a more sustainable and slower approach to tourism in the COIMBRA ST LLM project (or as it is locally known SHIFT COIMBRA) led by the municipality of Coimbra and involving a multi-level and sector partnership with the Intermunicipal Community of Coimbra Region, Tourism of Portugal, Polytechnic University of Coimbra, Coimbra University, Instituto Pedro Nunes, Present Technologies, INOVA+, and three transfer partners - Iasi Municipality, Municipality of Padova and Salamanca City Hall.

5 Ways COIMBRA ST LLM is paving the way for sustainable tourism:

1. Creating a hub for sustainable tourism. At the heart of COIMBRA ST LLM's vision is the development of a digital and physical space – the Coimbra Welcome Centre 4.0. This innovative hub will serve as a central point for information, fostering data-driven decision-making at various levels based on real-time insights. Crucially, it will also provide a platform for dialogue and collaboration among stakeholders, ensuring the long-term success and sustainability of the project and the creation of an active and engaged ecosystem. In this context, one of the primary objectives has been the direct engagement with residents and relevant stakeholders for addressing the diverse structural challenges and social dynamics within each area and neighbourhood of the city.
2. Certifying a sustainable destination while preserving authenticity. Coimbra's rich cultural heritage, including its UNESCO World Heritage status, is a significant draw for tourists. However, the project proactively seeks to adopt sustainable practices by the local tourism industry that are visibly valued by both tourists and residents while promoting a more balanced distribution of tourism activity beyond the UNESCO World Heritage Site. The city has already launched the new website and a toolkit for tour operators developed to increase the average length of stay. Implementing further strategies to counter high seasonality, concentrated tourist flows, short stays, and a lack of pre-trip knowledge among visitors, COIMBRA ST LLM aims to ensure a more balanced tourism ecosystem, pilot testing a new European Sustainable Tourism Certification Model.
3. Welcoming trained workers and practitioners in the sector. Identifying missing skills and evolving demands of the tourism industry, COIMBRA ST LLM aims to equip the current and future workforce with the necessary skills for a sustainable future. This includes tailored training programmes for existing employees, new entrants, and migrants, focusing on green and digital competencies. By investing in human capital, the project seeks to address skills gaps and promote a more environmentally conscious and technologically adept tourism sector. Indirectly, this holistic approach, reinforced by demanding criteria for pilot case contractors in sustainable mobility and waste management, will also cultivate the widespread adoption of circular practices, fostering a continuous "learn-by-doing" skill upgrade across the industry.
4. Providing smart tools for managing tourism data and understanding traveller preferences. COIMBRA ST LLM is exploring the potential of artificial intelligence, with the goal of creating a system that accompanies and actively involves tourists before, during, and after their visit, gathering valuable data on economic impact, carbon footprint, community perceptions, and visitors’ behaviour. The experimentation with Large Language Models (LLMs) used in the project can significantly help in the process of tackling the lack of tools for visitors to become more aware, as mentioned in the introduction. This data-driven approach will not only enhance the tourist experience, making it more enriching and memorable, but also enhance planning and facilitate a slower and more aware form of tourism.
5. Building a regional network for sustainable growth. COIMBRA ST LLM envisions Coimbra as the gateway to regional tourism routes, facilitating the collaboration within a broader regional network, established through strong partnerships with regional stakeholders and implementing an integrated strategy. The project aims to leverage tourism as a driver for resilient, innovative, and sustainable growth across the region. The promotion of inclusive governance and community-driven tourism development has already begun through events like the first World Café which occurred on the same day as the kick-off. Focused on training, sustainable certification, and technology it emphasised the importance of co-creation, shared knowledge and transfer of best practices.

The journey towards sustainable tourism is a collective one, requiring innovative solutions and a fundamental shift in perspective. It becomes strategic to test the approaches necessary to tackle the multiple issues of sustainable urban tourism, as launched in the Sustainable Tourism Partnership under the Urban Agenda for the EU. These approaches range, as COIMBRA ST LLM aims to demonstrate, from multi-level governance, innovative policy design and implementation, enabling circularity, resilience and accessibility, enhancing competencies and addressing unbalanced growth while safeguarding cultural heritage and ensuring long-term benefits for both residents and visitors.