Travel & Transport Management: Contemporary Issues and Approaches

Flashcards covering contemporary issues, economic principles, geographic concepts, globalisation, marketing variables, and management tasks in the context of tourist transport.

Economics

The study of methods of allocating scarce resources and distributing the product of those resources, as well as the study of the consequences of these methods.

Scarcity

The concept illustrating that most resources in society are finite, requiring decisions on the best way to use and sustain them.

Natural resources

A factor of production defined by economists, such as land.

Labour

A factor of production consisting of human resources and entrepreneurship.

Capital

Synthetic aids used to assist in the production of goods.

Factors of production

The collective set of resources (natural resources, labour, and capital) used to produce commodities.

Commodities

Items produced using factors of production, divided into goods (tangible products) and services (intangible items).

National product

The total output of all commodities in a country over a specific period of time, normally a year.

Microeconomics

The study of individual decisions and interactions, including consumers' decisions on what to buy and firms' decisions on what to produce.

Macroeconomics

The study of the entire economy and its interactions, including population, income, total unemployment, inflation, and money supply.

Elasticity of demand

A measure of the impact of income on tourism demand, calculated as: $\text{Elasticity of demand} = \frac{\text{Percentage change in tourism demand}}{\text{Percentage change in disposable income}}$

Inelastic demand

A condition where the demand for goods fulfilling basic needs, such as food and water, remains relatively unchanging.

Elastic demand

A condition where the demand for luxury items, like holiday and pleasure travel, fluctuates due to factors such as income or price.

Price-elasticity

A measure of the inverse relationship between demand and price, calculated as: $\text{Price-elasticity} = \frac{\text{Percentage change in quantity of tourism product demanded}}{\text{Percentage change in tourism product price}}$

Load factor

An expression of available capacity used by transport companies to calculate and maximize passenger revenue and profitability.

Oligopoly

A market condition where a small number of suppliers control the supply of a service.

Monopoly

A market condition where a single supplier has exclusive control over services.

Duopoly

A market condition where two companies control the supply of services.

Space

A key concept in geography referring to an area, usually the earth's surface.

Location

A geographical concept describing the position of something within space.

Place

A geographical concept referring to an identifiable position on the earth's surface.

Nodes

The locations or places connected by linkages and flows within a transport system.

Globalisation

The increasing geographical scale of economic, social, and political interactions, including the mobility of capital and the growth of tourism.

Oneworld

A large airline alliance grouping including carriers such as American Airlines, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, Qantas, and others.

Sky Team

An airline alliance grouping including Aeroflot, Air France, Alitalia, Delta, and Korean Air, among others.

Star Alliance

An airline alliance grouping including Air Canada, Lufthansa, Singapore Airlines, United Airlines, and others.

Recurring congestion

Forms of congestion that occur at the same place and same time every day, common among commuters or school runs.

Non-recurring congestion

Forms of congestion arising from temporary conditions such as road works or interruptions in the transport network, often causing bottlenecks.

Strategic planning

The process of developing and maintaining a strategic fit between an organisation’s goals, capabilities, and changing marketing opportunities.

SWOT analysis

An environmental scanning approach that considers the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats of products and services.

Marketing research

An organised process associated with gathering, processing, analyzing, storing, and disseminating information to improve decision-making.

Marketing mix

The mixture of controllable variables—Product, Price, Promotion, and Place—used by a firm to pursue sales in a target market.

Service intangibility

A characteristic of services meaning they cannot be seen, tasted, felt, heard, or smelt before purchase.

Service perishability

A characteristic of services meaning they cannot be stored for sale or use at a later date.

Service inseparability

A characteristic of services meaning they are usually produced and consumed at the same time and cannot be separated from the providers.

Planning (Management)

A management task focused on setting goals and recognizing the means to achieve them.

Organising (Management)

A management task where work functions are broken into tasks, linked to a structure, and assigned to individuals.

Leading (Management)

The method of motivating and influencing staff to ensure they perform tasks effectively to achieve organisational goals.

Controlling (Management)

The management method by which information is gathered about what has to be done.

Demographic factors

Factors related to the changing composition of a population, including birth rates, mortality rates, and the burden of dependency.