Tourism in England has grown to become an activity worth around £111billion to the English economy, and constituting around 4% of employment. This has led to increasing numbers of local areas becoming involved with tourism development. However local authorities supporting tourism are impacted by financial pressures and pressures for ‘less government’, which are indicative of a ‘managerial paradigm’ which has surrounded public sector management in England. This study has examined the impact of the managerial paradigm on management of tourism at the local level. Using the English cities as a ‘case’, a methodological triangulation of questionnaire and contact with senior management in local authorities involved with tourism policy was used. The findings have led to an important understanding of the current picture concerning public sector management of tourism at the local level. This study has found that tourism is worth over £17billion to the English cities, and supports around 360,000 jobs. The findings suggest that the driving forces that characterised the managerial state continue to impact management of local tourism. This study has also examined the impact of policy changes introduced by the Conservative/Liberal Democratic Coalition government on local tourism. The accession of a new government has led to a significant realignment in public sector engagement with tourism. Policy discourse has stressed government ambition for tourism to be ‘industry-led’ with a ‘re-balancing’ the economy towards the private sector. As a result, this study has found the most significant challenges facing local tourism management centre around financial pressures. Reductions in tourism budgets are leading to major changes in departmental structures and tourism managers’ roles. Reductions in tourism budgets are leading to significant pressures on tourism departments to raise income in order to make departments financially viable. This study has found that in some cases local authorities are ceasing to financially-support tourism. This research also suggests that pressure from government for the private sector to increasingly fund tourism partnerships may be difficult to achieve locally. Respondents have argued that high levels of engagement with the private sector already exist locally, and as the private sector in tourism is predominately small businesses there are limitations as to how much such businesses can contribute to marketing partnerships. Policy for the private sector having the ‘majority power’ in the new emerging tourism partnerships may also have implications for the motivation of such partnerships. Doubts have been raised in this study from within the public sector, concerning the ability of local tourism businesses to take ‘responsibility for their own future’ whilst at the same time protecting the public interest. It is concluded that a ‘realignment’ towards more private sector involvement in partnerships brings with it potential consequences if local tourism businesses are unable to ‘increasingly fund’ the new arrangements, and the new tourism bodies are unable to establish a ‘pluralistic’ tourism policy environment in their areas. With evident reductions in local authority budgets, it is legitimate to question the scope of funding that the emerging DMOs will have at their disposal, and thus their ability to deliver local ambitions for tourism development. Therefore, the new tourism partnerships will require careful structuring and management. However, their financial futures will inevitably hinge on the value that the private sector places on the new local tourism arrangement, and their ability to maintain the public interest will depend on striking an appropriate balance of power amongst all stakeholders within the partnership.

Perceptions and attitudes can have a major impact on the motivations for countryside people to visit city destinations as tourists. The findings from this study present the two major motivations; extraordinary experiences and travelling for specific events, along with several further aspects, which motivate people in the countryside to visit cities. However, the motivations can change over time and are not necessarily the same for each visit, thus, the motivations are essential for the decision-making process, travel intentions, as well as meeting the personal wants and needs when travelling. But still, to research the motivations for countryside people to visit city destinations as tourists, it is important to learn their travel behaviour and understand their perceptions and attitudes toward cities, as these aspects have a major impact on the decision-making process, frequency of travel, and choice of destinations. Although, other perspectives impact the decision-making process as well, such as destination image, travel distance, transport, accessibility, economy, and time availability. This indicates that people who live in the countryside tend to travel to cities only for a shorter amount of time, such as weekends or long-weekends, to experience something they cannot in their everyday life, which in turn can feel luxurious. Therefore, the majority of the countryside people associate cities with positive experiences, but the general associations with cities are negative, due to the fact that they would not choose to stay here for longer than their travel intentions.    The purpose of this research is to investigate the motivations of people who live in the countryside to visit city destinations as tourists, study their perceptions and attitudes toward cities and how this impacts their decision-making process and general perspectives of cities. Interviews with 30 people who currently live in the countryside will support the research and answer the research questions, to provide results and connect this back to previous research, which have helped to support the results of this study as well. Suggestions are made for further research on this topic or similar aspects, which can help to improve the understanding of the countryside people’s travel behaviour. As a major theme in the tourism industry is to learn and understand the tourist and the travel behaviours, it is important to do so from all aspects, which could benefit both the traveller, suppliers and further research. The perspectives that have been investigated in this study, have not been researched before, and therefore, it may provide for new opportunities and knowledge about the topic that could benefit future research. Furthermore, future research can help to support the results and knowledge contribution from this research, providing similar results, and improve knowledge about city tourism in the future.

This thesis is dealing with town side recreation. Natural environment, with forest as a dominating factor, is very important in this issue. Forests attract their visitors thanks to specific atmosphere and mostly they don{\crq}t need any additional equipment to fulfill their purpose within the frame of tourism. This doesn{\crq}t apply on smaller forest stands, so-called small-scale forest units, that attract just minimal attention by themselves. Small-scale forest units are offering relax potential, but this potential need to be developed. Through the use of convenient ground shaping, equipping and promotion of these small-scale forest units is possible to gain new recreation localities. This thesis is dealing with development of small-scale forest units nearby city Tábor.