The Local Version of City Walk is Born
The summer holiday tourism season is in full swing, and the hottest form of travel at the moment has evolved from "commando-style" rapid travel to City Walk.
HeyTrip understands that "City Walk", a travel method originating in London, has now welcomed a new wave of popularity. Unlike the high-intensity, fast-paced "commando-style" travel, City Walk emphasizes a leisurely, comfortable, and slow-paced urban experience. HeyTrip learned that since June, the search volume or order volume for City Walk on various travel platforms has grown by 1 to 5 times, especially favored by tourists in cities like Shanghai, Beijing, and Xi'an. To date, the notes tagged with #Holiday City Walk# on Xiaohongshu have exceeded 510 million views.
In essence, "City Walk" is a kind of urban rambling, without a specific goal or plan, not pursuing quick check-ins, but just using footsteps to feel every street and lane, experiencing unique grassroots culture and rich humanistic atmosphere. This term, considered a trendy version of "taking a walk," has become a new lifestyle for young people.
Why is City Walk so popular?
City Walk has become a popular leisure activity. It's not only seen by young people as a novel dating and socializing method, but also gives people an opportunity to design and share their walking routes. HeyTrip believes that the essence of City Walk is to slow down, enjoying the city's culture, history, and charm.
The popularity of City Walk is related to young people's travel consumption preferences. HeyTrip understands that the travel consumption trend in 2023 shows that unique, relaxed, unexpected surprises, and in-depth local experiences are favored. Young people are more inclined to choose nearby, economical, quiet, and food-rich travel styles. As the pandemic restricts long-distance travel, it also allows more people to start exploring the "small yet certain happiness" around them.
Therefore, it's not surprising that City Walk is booming. It meets young people's expectations for travel, allowing them to feel and experience the city's vibe and life in places like ancient buildings, well-designed bookstores, stylish coffee shops, distinctive taverns, and even markets.
The Promising Small and Beautiful Business of City Walk
City Walk is similar to the small-scale local tourism "micro-vacation" model during the pandemic, emphasizing a slow-paced deep experience. Now, in big cities like Beijing, Shanghai, and Guangzhou, a new business model of city walk is flourishing.
HeyTrip found that these business models are often provided by professional urban research organizations, youth outdoor activity groups, and travel agency guides. At the same time, some residents who have lived locally for a long time also participate. Prices vary widely, with professional institutions offering routes from 99 to 158 yuan, individual guides charging 60 yuan/hour, and overtime costing 100 yuan/hour, and even individual experience services offered only on weekends at a rate of 35 yuan/hour.
However, despite the growing demand, city walking is still a niche activity in our country, with no large-scale market formed, and the quality of products and services is inconsistent. Some amateur service providers are only playing the card of basic information differences, without core competitiveness. Their products hardly spark consumers' willingness to pay, which is not conducive to people's in-depth understanding of city walks.
Therefore, HeyTrip believes that although City Walk has a broad market prospect, it still has a long way to go before the number of paying people increases and professional products are stably supplied. At present, this is more like a diversion activity, or a niche hobby. But as post-90s and post-00s gradually become the main consumers of tourism, City Walk is expected to welcome greater prosperity.
Promoting the City Walk Craze
HeyTrip learned that since July, riding on the popularity of "City Walk", relevant departments in Beijing, Nanjing, Xi'an, and other places have also recommended free classic walking routes to the public.
The Beijing central axis is a classic walk route, with a total length of 7.8 kilometers, starting from the Drum Tower, passing through Wanning Bridge, the Forbidden City, Tai Temple, Sheji Altar, Duanmen, Tiananmen, Zhengyangmen, and heading south to Yongdingmen. "Beijing Release" suggests a combination of "bus subway cycling walking" for sightseeing.
The "Nanjing Release" WeChat public account also launched 10 Nanjing city walk routes, from Pingshi Street - Shengzhou Road - Xinanli - Vientiane World - Little West Lake - Laomendong - Confucius Temple to immerse yourself in the collision of history and trends, from Fengfu Road - Nantai Alley - Wangfu Street - National Creation Park to feel the bustling city, from Shanghai Road - Taoli New Village - Nanxiu Village - Gold and Silver Street - Yihe Road to catch the city's artistic style...
The Shaanxi Provincial Department of Culture and Tourism also recommended 3 city walk routes to netizens. The longer route is about 3 kilometers, from Peace Gate - Old Vegetable Market City Well Cultural Creative Block - Xi'an Incident Memorial Hall - Yongxingfang, it takes 40 minutes to complete, which is a route to feel the collision of cultural trends; the shorter route is only 460 meters, from Xiangzi Temple Street - Defu Lane - Fen Lane, where you can explore treasure shops.
City Walk, as a new way to understand a city, is different from playing in fixed attractions, it's more about experiencing culture in different streets and alleys. HeyTrip suggests that this requires cities to pay attention to preserving characteristics and forming personality during their development. An ancient building, a street with a story, a lane full of culture will all give tourists a different experience, while monotonous street scenes will lose their charm.
