The Visual characteristics of railside landscape for tourists’ satisfaction

Abstract

Moving Landscape Aesthetic Quality (MLAQ) has been a topic that had taken less attention from the researchers. Though a great effort is given to interpret the aesthetic quality of the landscape, the tourists’ preference for the moving journey has not been much talked about. The objective of this research is to study the Independent and interdependent moving Railside landscape character through landscape indicators, which is found by considering the tourist satisfaction. This paper gives important information on human landscape preference (perception) which will add value to the moving railway landscape. The study is based on seven landscape indicators (coherence, disturbance, complexity, mystery, naturalness, Imageability, and visual scale). Colombo Fort to Badulla railway landscape experience is investigated with a sample of thirty participants. Data was collected based on an online questionnaire survey with quantitative and qualitative data. Six case studies were selected for the survey by analyzing the overall result of the areas by considering the geomorphology and the spatial character of the landscape. Findings revealed that the moving landscape character of the railway journey inspires the tourist satisfaction.