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Top1. Introduction
As an industry, tourism is very important as it can bring significant economic and social benefits to a country or region. The tourism industry has rapidly become a cost-effective solution for struggling economies. The Saudi Vision 2030 recognizes that tourism is a major sector of the service industries and one that should be developed and promoted. Saudi Arabia is one of the oldest and most well- known countries for the richness of its historical sites. Hence, the effective promotion of tourism will contribute to enhancing the tourists’ perception of Saudi Arabia as an attractive tourist destination. The historical and cultural potential of the country, which includes all socio-cultural environments with their particular traditions and customs, as well as historic villages and palaces, is the foundation of cultural tourism (Ismagilova, 2015). In Saudi Arabia, cultural heritage plays an essential role in the tourism industry since it is based on the Saudi community's cultural legacy. Cultural heritage sites in Saudi Arabia include archaeological sites, heritage places, villages, historical cities, museums, and geographical areas (natural heritage) (Al-Tokhais, 2020).
Over the past two decades, the promotion of tourism has continued to advance with the help of information technology; in addition, the Internet has had a significant impact on the tourism industry, especially when tourists are searching for information and services (R. A. Hamed, 2019). In most countries, Web GIS has become the main means of promoting tourism. GIS's capacity to analyze and visualize spatial and non-spatial data in the form of maps has made it an indispensable tool for the tourist industry. Web-based GIS has become a popular means of information exchange and visualization with the evolution of Web technologies and GIS. GIS can be integrated with various other technologies to create new levels of accessibility and functionality (Abel, 2012).
The Web map industry has witnessed considerable development with the advent of Google Maps. It can provide interactive mapping services involving destination-specific tourist information, which offers a new way to plan trips and access information about a destination (Pan, 2007). In particular, maps are of great value to tourists as they can convey a large amount of easily understood information accompanied by photographs of an area or site (Tallinucci, 2004). An interactive map allows the user to interact with the map by changing the view or zooming in/out. Importantly, one feature allows the user to view information about the place on the map through the pop-up. A more detailed account of the interactive map is given below.
In this paper, the authors develop and implement an interactive map intended to promote historical and tourist sites, taking the Aseer region as a case study. Currently, there is no interactive map available that promotes the cultural, historical, and tourism sites of Aseer. Therefore, an interactive map will offer a technical solution to the problem of effectively promoting this region as a tourist destination. Thus, the main motivation behind this research is to develop an interactive map involving all historical and tourism sites in Aseer. The proposed interactive map is intended to provide tourists and non-tourists with a valuable reference that provides comprehensive information and visualization of the Aseer region that will encourage tourism and exploration.
The main contributions of this paper are the development of a Web application containing an interactive map that gives tourists spatial and non-spatial information about the Aseer region. It provides information about road conditions and access to various sites in terms of difficulty. Also, the paper gives a comprehensive description of the GIS and its uses in the tourism sector using a social survey.