In this paper, by using geostatistical methods, such as semi-variance function and Kriging spatial interpolator method, we analyzed temporal-spatial distribution pattern, structural characteristics and variability of tourism festivals in Shandong Province in 1990, 1999, 2005 and 2011, and established suitable models. Based on quantitative analyses, we made the conclusions as follows: (1) Spatial distribution of the numbers of tourism festivals is significantly imbalanced, showing an overall "high in the east, low in the west" pattern with the shape of a three-step ladder. (2) There are clear spatial structural characteristics in terms of correlations of the events, with positive and negative correlations existing simultaneously. When the separation distance gets longer, the positive spatial correlation decreases, and in the meantime negative correlation increases. (3) Compared to 1990, the value of partial sill increased by 20.61 times in 2011; variable range increased from 115.5 km to 335 km; structural variance ratio decreased from 69% to 26%; the impact of random factors weakened, but the role of structural factors strengthened. (4) In terms of spatial fractal dimension, the values trended down and the spatial variations increased in all directions. The most significant variation was in the east-west direction; the rest of the directions were relatively balanced, showing a spatial development pattern with the characteristics of plate-like and anisotropic distribution. (5) Three main factors contribute to the evolvement of developmental variability of tourism festivals in Shandong Province: level of economic development, tourism supply capacity, and transportation accessibility.

Urban leisure green space is a typical green open space very important for maintenance of urban ecological security and human health. Accessibility to urban leisure green spaces directly affects the quality of services for city dwellers and reflects the region's urbanization level. Accessibility to urban green spaces can be used as an indicator to assess the effectiveness of providing ecological services to residents of the green areas in current system and long-term future system. With socio-economic development, Chinese people and governments are paying much more attention to urban green spaces, and more and more citizens have the desire of contact with nature, and are willing to live close to urban green spaces. Consequently, governments plan to develop and optimize urban green space allocation to meet these demands. In this paper, a quantitative method based on landscape accessibility of green space in Hangzhou City was employed to improve index systems. Aided by GIS technique, this paper conducts analysis on the accessibility and service ability which considers the population densities of every district, applying the methods of buffer zone, minimum distance and travel. The results indicate that: (1) In Hangzhou City, on average it takes 3.8 minutes from a residential area to a urban leisure green space, and 92.11 percent of urban residents have access to a leisure green space within 10 minutes; the residential areas with poor accessibility are the outskirt areas of the city. (2) As to scenic-spot green spaces, their accessible time is 20.33 minutes. Xihu and Xixi are found to be much more accessible than other scenic spots. (3) The accessibility exhibits a structure of annulations centered around Xihu, the farther the distance is away from Xihu, the poorer the accessibility is. The work of this paper will help improve the key index system for assessing urban green spaces in China, and can provide planners and policymakers with important and valuable information for urban green space planning and assessment.

Based on graphic analysis and density calculation, this paper studies the characteristics of the spatial distribution of world heritage sites, mainly cultural and natural heritage, of Africa at continental, regional and state levels. As of 2012, a total of 126 sites in Africa are included in the World Heritage List. In 1978, world heritage sites from Africa were added to the World Heritage List for the first time, followed by a burst of number increase for a short period of time. After that, for many years it has been slow in terms of new heritage sites being added. Now it is the time to explore the characteristics of the spatial distribution of world heritage sites in Africa, and the study provides a reference for site selections in the interactions and exchanges with African states. The study has found that the world heritage sites are relatively concentrated on the continental coasts and islands, in mid-size river basins and eastern local areas, with higher densities in Eastern, Northern and Western, and the highest in Eastern Africa. Among the states, Senegal, Tunisia, Gambia, Cape Verde, Mauritius and the Seychelles have the highest densities, followed by C?te d'Ivoire, Morocco, Togo, Kenya, Uganda, Malawi, Zimbabwe and other states. Except for Malawi, Zimbabwe and Mauritius, the states with higher density of cultural heritage sites, including Egypt, Morocco, Tunisia, Senegal, Benin, Ghana, Togo, the Gambia, Cape Verde, Ethiopia, Kenya and other states are in Eastern, Western and Northern Africa. The corridor of Cameroon-Central Africa- Democratic Republic of Congo is the region rich natural heritage. At the regional level, except for Northern Africa, there are higher densities of natural heritage sites in other regions, with the highest density in Eastern Africa. At the state level, except for Tunisia, the states with higher densities of natural heritage sites, including Niger, Guinea, C?te d'Ivoire, Senegal, Cameroon, the Central African Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Tanzania, Kenya, Seychelles, Uganda, Madagascar, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Malawi are in those regions. In addition, the distribution and density of world heritage sites at the regional level and the state level are showing good overlap.

Development of rural tourism provides an approach to solving the problems with agriculture, farmers and rural areas. Implementation of the standards for the rural tourism quality rating system helps promote the transformation of the traditional rural areas and agriculture resources into collective farms and industrial operations, and helps ensure a sustainable rural tourism development. In this paper, in the context of regional cooperation, we compared the evaluation categories of rural tourism quality standards among the four provinces on the west coast of Taiwan Strait, and found that creation and evaluation of rural tourism quality standards are different in different areas, which hinders the integrated development of the rural tourism industry. It is important to establish the criteria for the tourism products of the same level and quality based on demands and feedback of tourists. The framework of the evaluation system should contain three major components: mechanisms of allocation and cooperation of the functions of stakeholders, examination of the comparable indices of tourism quality, and assessment of the core values of tourism products, in order to further specify and improve the rural tourism quality standards, and to promote the integrated development of star region of rural tourism on the west coast of Taiwan strait. As a typical case, this study serves as a guide for a standardized rural tourism development.

Visual landscape study has a wide application prospect in the construction of scenic spots as well as urban and rural planning and management. Related foreign researches in the last decade were reviewed and divided into three parts in this paper: visual landscape quality assessment, visual impact assessment, and visual landscape preference. The basic implications and theoretical sources were introduced. This paper mainly concerns the topics, methods and techniques of each field. At the same time, advantages, disadvantages as well as relevant significance were analyzed. First, in landscape quality assessment, the research emphasis was the contribution of landscape elements and features to landscape quality. Psychophysical approaches were commonly used in this area, but there was an apparent tendency toward combination of the expert-based approach and the psychophysical approach. Secondly, visual impact caused by urban and rural buildings and renewable-energy facilities received much attention. GIS and 3D visualization techniques enlarged temporal-spatial scales and improved the precision of quality and impact assessment. Thirdly, scholars investigated visual landscape preference from two perspectives: human and landscape which was respectively subjective and objective part of appreciation. Not only human natural and cultural attributes but also landscape features were deeply explored to demonstrate the influence in landscape preference. It was confirmed that landscape preference could promote landscape preservation and rational land use. In conclusion, the progresses of the studies on visual landscape were summarized as follows: visual landscape study was more instructive in landscape planning and construction, because the subjective and objective methods were gradually integrated and the techniques were diversified; study areas were unbalanced and study objects were a little dull, so more relevant researches should be made in the developing countries and scholars should pay much attention to visual impact of a large variety of landscape types; there was a need for comprehensive perspectives as the number of interdisciplinary studies was increasing; the foreign researches had some enlightenment for the domestic ones.

With the rapid development of tourism, various resource and environmental problems have been constantly emerging in tourism destination areas. The research on sustainable development of tourism destinations can promote the optimization of comprehensive benefit and the exertion of ecosystem service function for tourism destinations. There have been abundant achievements in the research on sustainable development of tourism destinations at home and abroad. The research progress was reviewed from the three aspects in this paper, including research process, research methods and main research content. Firstly, the course of the research at home and abroad was summarized and divided into three phases: initial exploration, rapid development, consolidation and deepening. Secondly, main research methods were analyzed comprehensively in terms of their characteristics and the insufficiency, which include tourism environment capacity evaluation, tourism environment impact evaluation, evaluation indices, limits of acceptable change, tourism ecology footprint. Thirdly, the major research contexts were reviewed from seven aspects, including the concepts and the level of sustainable development of tourism destinations, the course and the mechanism of the development of tourism destinations, carrying capacity and ecosystem safety of the environment of tourism destinations, tourism sustainable development model, local residents' and visitors' perceptions of the impacts of tourism, low-carbon development of tourism destinations, and the impacts of tourism enterprises. Finally, the perspectives of the research on sustainable development of tourism destinations in China were put forward from the aspects of theory, methods, and content.