The most prominent obstacles to tourism activity in the holy city of Karbala

Ahlam Hassan Jassim Abdul Karim
Supervised by Asst. Prof. Dr. Fawaz Hamdan Abboud

1. Poor geographical distribution of basic services provided to visitors in particular and the involvement of residents coming to the city for tourism purposes in the basic services system designed primarily for local residents, which reflects the severe deficiency in the nature of the performance of this system, which burdens the city and its residents with large service burdens and additional pressure, which is reflected in the possibility of providing a decent level of services, which has negative consequences on the structure of the tourist city in general.

2. Poor urban planning for religious institutions in the city and the surrounding various urban facilities, so religious shrines suffer from severe functional crowding with many other uses such as housing, trade, administrative and financial institutions, and this urban structure does not provide the spatial requirements for these religious and tourist places and their functional and regional status, which reflects the weak performance of the religious function of the city.

3. Neglecting many tourism areas closely linked to religious institutions and places and limiting their functional and planning role in contributing to the process of supporting religious tourism, such as paying attention to green areas, places of rest and entertainment, and various entertainment services.

4. Problems of the internal road network and its functional overlap and planning neglect, which creates obstacles and difficulties for tourists to reach religious places easily and spend their free time, in addition to the problems resulting from means of transportation and communication, which are still of limited validity.

5. Weak tourism capabilities in the city, especially with regard to tourism companies and specialized tourism offices, in addition to the lack of financial and banking services in particular, which makes the city lose many means of developing the tourism sector in the eyes of visitors, especially foreigners, who are looking for high-level tourism services.

6. The noticeable and great neglect in dealing with tourism activities within the scope of the state’s policy and economic plans, and the limited dealing with it as an important economic resource of the state’s resources, and the complete reliance on oil revenues to support the country’s economy, knowing that the future of oil is depleting, unlike tourism, which is considered an inexhaustible oil (1).

(1) Mahmoud Abu al-Fadl Ibrahim, Lecture on the History of Egypt and Cairo, 1st ed., Dar Ihya al-Kutub al-Arabiyya, 1387 AH / 1967 AD, p. 567.