Xi Shan Auto Tour Forum: How to Create China’s Must-Drive Routes of the Year

    Regarding the first auto tour routes design seminar being held at Xi Shan in Suzhou, Fu Qiang, director of the Economic and Tourism Development Bureau of the Wu Zhong Xi Shan National Modern Agriculture Demonstration Zone Management Committee, expressed warm welcome: In recent years, Taihu Xi Shan Island has attracted more and more auto touring users for its unique and beautiful natural scenery, environment, and local produce, making auto tourists a major visitor group for Xi Shan tourism. Wang Sheng, deputy secretary of Jinting Town, Wu Zhong District, Suzhou, introduced that to better meet the needs of auto tourists, the local government is vigorously carrying out infrastructure construction and supporting work such as the island-looping highway, tourist distribution centers, hotels, and resorts, while also re-planning and renovating existing scenic spots. Therefore, they particularly value and actively participate in the 2013 China Auto Tour Routes Selection, as the annual selection provides a platform for communication and connection with national auto touring users and industry resources, which can drive and assist the transformation of Xi Shan tourism.

    Zhang Wenjian, opinion leader of the 2013 China Auto Tour Routes Selection and professor at the Tourism College of Shanghai Normal University, pointed out that China’s tourism is showing trends of diversified demand, free travel, and deepened experience. Suzhou Xi Shan should combine its outstanding leisure resource endowment to fully grasp this trend and achieve the transition from sightseeing to leisure vacation—the advanced stage of tourism. This transformation requires extensive social support and assistance, and the China Auto Tour Routes Annual Selection provides a very good lever. The selection attempts to use internet methods such as crowdsourcing, large platforms, and big data to gather and mobilize the resources and enthusiasm of management bodies and route designers such as tourism bureaus, scenic spots, travel agencies, clubs, media communities, etc., to jointly create China’s annual must-drive auto tour routes, providing innovative and practical auto tour products for the majority of auto touring users, thereby achieving a positive cycle of value creation, flow, and sharing between the industry and consumers.

    Li Keqi, founder and CEO of Aijia Media, stated that since October 1, when the annual selection entered the experience voting stage, the 66 nominated routes have received increasing attention from users, and the participation enthusiasm of related tourism bureaus and scenic spots has also been growing. To promote resource management bodies and route designers to jointly create the freshest, most unique, and most valuable auto tour route products for users, the selection organizing committee specially held the first official experience event, the “Jiading Automotive Culture Ultimate Journey,” on November 9. Thanks to the top-tier events, car extreme sports, and other unique resources provided and fully promoted by the resource management body Shanghai Jiading Tourism Bureau and the route designer Shanghai International Circuit, the event achieved great success. He hopes that Suzhou Xi Shan, as a route resource management body, can focus on the uniqueness of tourism resources and the innovation of product design, and ultimately achieve good results in the annual selection.

    Chen Jun, PR director of Aijia Media, finally introduced that starting December 1, the route selection voting enters the final month of the sprint stage. According to the current progress of online voting, the 36 annual must-drive routes have begun to take shape. To deliver an excellent China Auto Tour Annual Guide to auto touring users nationwide next March 6, Aijia Media has proactively formed an editorial team consisting of opinion leaders, volunteers, and Aijia Net editors, and has started the editing work for the 2014 edition of the book “Aijia Travelers’ 36 Must-Drive Routes in a Lifetime.” Choosing to gather and discuss at Xi Shan in Suzhou is aimed at exploring, in the context of the increasingly widespread use of mobile internet, how to fully leverage the advantages of paper, and present the 36 China Auto Tour must-drive routes unveiled at the end of the year to tens of millions of auto touring users through the form of a book: with exquisite and magnificent images, elegant and concise text, and carefully selected and unique information, each route will focus on recommending the freshest, most special, and most interesting ways to play around its theme.