Analysis of Effects of Tourism on Development Process of the Urban Villages Case: Serein County

Introduction In the last half-century, tourism has been considered as one of the most efficient factors in socioeconomic reconstruction and development of rural districts and non-urban areas. Tourism can be nominated as driver of peace, because it underlies friendship and mutual understanding between nations and brings peace without polluting the human environmental interactions unlike other productive industries. Today, tourism is a promising activity which is reminded as development pathway. In recent years, tourism as a new form of industry has had many effects on economic, social and cultural status of the world. Job creation, regional balance, helping to global peace, helping to investment on cultural heritages, improvement in the environment conditions, helping to improve wild life, development of rural districts which are endowed with tourism attractions and preventing migrations and etc. are some advantages of this industry. Iran is a country which has many different tourism attractions. Our country is among top ten in terms of tourism attractions; it is among top five countries in terms of tourism variations and among top three countries in terms of variations in handicrafts. According to tourism ranking in South Asia, tourism is dominated by Iran after India. It can be said that Serein County is the most attractive county in some seasons in Ardebil province. It can be said that Serein County is the most attractive county in some seasons in Ardebil province. Methodology  Regarding its aim, this study is a practical one and regarding its methodology, it is a descriptive-analytic one. Data collection has been done by literature review, field study and using questionnaires. To analysis data, we have used a statistical test, T-Test which is considered as a parametric test. This test uses data with interval scale and ratio scale regarding the parametric test. The design of the questions can be changed to numerical indicators, so numerical equivalence is used in the form of Likert scale, describing the situations as very low to very high. The populations (or elements) are considered as the people with mutual characteristics including Hostess population of Serein and experts in the region. For sampling, Cochran Formula is used. For residential households which are 600 people, considering reliability level of 95%, and 6% possibility of acceptable error of estimation in sample size according to conducted surveys, these samples are 260 people and the population of experts regarding reliability level of 95% and 6% possibility of acceptable error of estimation is 56 people. Since organizational experts were unavailable in this region, the total number of people for distributing the questionnaires was 33 ones, so all of them were considered in questionnaires distribution. Discussion and Conclusion Even though our country is potential in tourism, it is taking the first steps and comparing other countries, the country still fails to find an outstanding position for itself in the world. The results show that by cooperation of private section, necessary infrastructures in tourism section have been developed partly and some standard hotels and accommodations have been constructed. On the other hand, visiting hot springs is possible in every season because of its conditions. So, we can consider it as a yearly active industry. Iran has many hot and mineral springs which have healing characteristics for many diseases and building hospitals with expert staffs and specialist doctors can create a good situation for medical tourism in the world. Springs in Iran, especially hot spring in Serein, are not introduced to the world and this causes that hydrotherapy be generally an attraction just for domestic tourists. Job creation and foreign exchange created by hot spring are some advantages that undoubtedly can be used for healing diseases and attracting domestic and international tourists by suitable and extensive announcements and also investment and cooperation of private section in development of accommodations and welfare centers. Documents and records of municipality for issuing building permits from 2003 to 2010 showed that in this period of time the number of issuing building permits increased which explains the constructions expansion and spatial-physical expansion during these years. The meaningful relation between spatial-physical changes in Serein during the exploitation of hydrotherapy treatment springs creates a meaningful relation between vertical expansion of Serein and tourism infrastructures and the conclusion of questionnaires about changing Ardebil to be the capital city of the province which were distributed among householders, experts and managers and its impact on Serein spatial-physical development and development of Serein because of its mineral springs and natural characteristics. So, the following strategies are notable about Serein: - Presenting a comprehensive plan for tourism development in accordance with rural and small town development; - Controlling irregular constructions of accommodations; - Good planning for `physical-spatial development and presenting strategies in suitable directions in Serein; - Avoiding unauthorized constructions on the farms around the city.