Georgios Boustras

Olympic legacy and cultural tourism: exploring the facets of Athens’ Olympic heritage

This study examines the effects of the Olympic Games on Athens’ cultural tourism and the city’s potential to leverage the Olympic legacy in synergy with its rich heritage in order to enhance its tourism product during the post-Games period. In doing so, a qualitative and interpretive approach was employed. This includes a literature review on Athens’ 2004 Olympics to identify the sport facilities and regeneration projects, which constitute the Olympic legacy and heritage. Based on that, an empirical analysis was undertaken, by collecting official documents about the 2004 Olympics, and conducting five semi-structured interviews with tourism/administrative officials. The findings indicate that the Olympiad contributed significantly to Athens’ built and human heritage, revealing the dimensions of new venues/facilities, infrastructure, transportation and aesthetic image of the city, and human capital enhancement. Hence, the Games affected to the multifaceted representation and reconstruction of the city’s identity and cultural heritage. However, the potential afforded from the post-Olympic Athens remains unrealised due to lack of strategic planning/management. The study concludes that there is a need to develop cross-leveraging synergies between the Olympic legacy and cultural tourism for the host city. Finally, a strategic planning framework for leveraging post-Games Olympic tourism is suggested in order to maximise the benefits of Olympic legacy and heritage in a host city’s tourism development.

Towards reviving post-Olympic Athens as a cultural destination.

This paper examines the effects of global change on the status and qualities of the Greek national capital, Athens, focusing on how they affect the development of cultural tourism in the city. Although Athens constituted one of the most significant destinations for Greek tourism in the past, in recent years it started to weaken. Athens is characterised by a series of problems, among them are the degradation of its environment and quality of life and traffic congestion. However, in terms of tourism development, the Olympic Games helped in re-imaging the city and upgrading its infrastructure. This study based on semi-structured interviews with top officials reveals how global change has affected Athens’ socio-cultural/economic status, identity and image. Despite the tourism policy/planning responses to global changes, Athens’ tourism continues to decline leaving unexplored potential such as its rich cultural heritage, new multicultural identity and the New Acropolis Museum. The paper suggests that cultural elements of capital cities must be multidimensional including a variety of attractions and amenities. The use of cultural heritage assets needs to be in line with global developments in order for cities to effectively leverage heritage for cultural tourism.

Forest fires’ impact on tourism development: a comparative study of Greece and Cyprus

Purpose – Every year thousands of acres are burned and a number of people lose their lives in forest fires that increasingly surpass the wild land limit and lead on to touristic, urban areas. By and large, Mediterranean countries rely highly on offering a tourist product based on sea, sun, culture and nature. While the sea and sun are not affected by fire catastrophes, places of cultural and natural beauty are indeed hit; tourists end up being uninformed with no proper guidance from the firefighting authorities. This paper seeks to address these issues.Design/methodology/approach – This paper attempts to highlight the relation between fire catastrophes and tourism development, to identify if and how state authorities take into account tourists in the planning and management of appropriate measures. A comparative study between Greece and Cyprus is presented. A number of interviews with stakeholders on the policy and operational level were conducted and the results and their implications are presented.Findi...

Analysis of the Determinants of Workplace Occupational Safety and HealtH Practice in Cyprus

Abstract This paper is a part of a wider study — funded by EU-OSHA — that has the central aim of describing how the characteristics of the regulatory framework and employment relations tradition affect establishments’ management of health and safety at work. In this quest, a number of countries have been chosen, among them Cyprus, and this paper attempts to present an answer to the aforementioned question in Cyprus. The Cypriot economy is made up of a large number of micro firms (employing fewer than 10 workers). A number of these firms are family owned, creating an unusual and particular economic and work landscape. Also, a relatively large number of workers remain undeclared. By considering and comparing secondary data at the local, national and EU level, the paper attempts to identify and explore the determinants of workplace occupational safety and health within the particular context and conditions in Cyprus.

Management of health and safety in micro companies in Cyprus: Results on ergonomic issues

BACKGROUND Ergonomics in Cyprus is a rather neglected area of safety. The size of the country, the lack of scientific expertise, the nature of the economy and the nature of the majority of the enterprises make it a case, different from the average. OBJECTIVE The aims of the survey were to examine the views and perceptions of employees and owners/managers on safety issues of micro-firms in Cyprus, to collect information on accidents and other aspects of safety performance in micro-firms and to cross-check the above data with data collected from safety inspectors for the above firms. METHODS The authors with the collaboration of the Department of Labour Inspection of the Republic of Cyprus collected information from a relatively large number of micro companies in a National survey. Information from employees, employers and labour inspectors was drawn. RESULTS Particular emphasis is paid on the exploration of the relationship of the non-use of personal protection equipment with a number of factors. Results show the resistance of employees to the use of PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) and GPM (General Protective Measures). CONCLUSIONS The results of the survey are in line with the relevant literature. Micro firms illustrate several interesting findings that are discussed in detail in the paper.

Safety awareness of practitioners in the Cypriot manufacturing sector

Purpose – In the last few years a number of industrial catastrophes in the Cypriot manufacturing sector have taken place, resulting in losses of millions of Euro and disrupting the industrial production for days and, in a few cases, weeks and months. In the absence of official (or unofficial) statistics regarding the fire preparedness of small and medium enterprises in terms of policy, training and equipment, the purpose of this paper is to gather information and opinions about the current safety situation in the Cypriot manufacturing sector.Design/methodology/approach – Results from a nationwide survey in Nicosia are presented in this paper. A closed questionnaire concentrating on industrial (manufacturing) premises affected and non‐affected by a previous fire incident was devised and used in a weighted sample of companies. An open questionnaire was employed for interviewing the managers of fire‐stricken companies. Four industrial areas in Nicosia are under investigation in this study and results are pre...

The investigation of fire growth in dwellings based on stochastic analysis

Two fire growth models for dwellings (3 realms) have been developed using a stochastic approach. The first is based on probability tree analysis and the fundamental work of Aoki [1] and Ramachandran [2]. The second one is a typical Markov approach to the problem. A state transition model was built in order to provide the appropriate transition probabilities needed by the two models and a known deterministic mainframe (CFAST 3.1.6) was used in order to close the set of equations in the probabilistic model. New criteria for the definition of the mean time spent in each of the fire stages--1) fire confined to room or area, 2) fire spread beyond room or area, 3) fire extinction or burn-out)--are proposed and, finally, results from both approaches are compared to each other and with previous analysis. The present models make an attempt to combine the randomness of stochasticity with the accuracy of a deterministic model based on the use of physical laws. As part of a probabilistic fire risk assessment tool, the models can be used to provide information for fire growth in buildings and be combined with a risk to life model to predict the risks to a human being in a fire situation.