Does High Speed Rail services influence tourists' choice? Some concerns from Paris and Roma and other linked cities

Improvement of transportation has contributed to tourism expansion. Indeed tourism implies mobility and mobility needs transportation. Furthermore, transportation links the various destinations and people, goods, and services. The link between HSR services and tourism has been investigated only recently in the literature, analysing potential effects of HSR on tourism (depending on the type of tourism), and local expectation of stakeholders. This paper analyses HSR services as a potential factor for the choice of a tourist destination from a quantitative point of view. Two case studies will be analysed and compared, i.e Roma and Paris. The results of two Revealed Preference surveys show that if HSR services are not a main factor in the destination choice, they have anyway affected the choice of Paris and Rome and differently. This analysis contributes to an evaluation of the High Speed Rail wider impacts on local economic dynamics. Keywords: High-Speed Rail, Tourism, Destination choice JEL codes: R-42; PO; L83