Cycling tourism in the cross-border part of the Carpathians on the example of the Transboundary Biosphere Reserve «Eastern Carpathians»: current state and development prospects

Abstract

Bicycle tourism is recognized as one of the sustainable types of tourism due to its safety for the environment. In recent years, its attractiveness is growing, which is due to the formation of healthy and helpful habits in the development of the personality in combination with the realization of cultural-cognitive, sports, emotional, educational, and other motives of the trip. Restrictions on international travel caused by the COVID-19 pandemic make bicycle tourism one of the available leisure and active recreation types. For the development of bicycle tourism, nature conservation areas of the border are actively involved, however, the analysis of recent publications shows that the problem of combining nature protection and their recreational functions is not yet sufficiently resolved, and the issues of bicycle infrastructure development and popularization of bicycle tourism require more attention in terms of the implementation of the sustainable development concept in Ukraine. The purpose of the work is to study the Transboundary Biosphere Reserve «Eastern Carpathians» of the Ukrainian-Polish-Slovak border to use its territories in the organization of bicycle tourism and to study the international experience of popularizing bicycle tourism and the possibility of its implementation in Ukraine. According to the research results, it was established that the Ukrainian Carpathians have all the necessary conditions for the development of cycling tourism, which is implemented with the support and assistance of the European Union. Every year in the Ukrainian Carpathians there are more and more bicycle routes of different difficulty categories: from calm easy routes along the banks of rivers to breathtak- ing bicycle routes with sharp ascents and descents, in total there are about 50 bicycle routes, most of the routes have markings and accesses for downloading in GPS trackers. The development of bicycle tourism in the Carpathians is supported by many projects, in particular, the projects «VeloKraina», «Velokarpattia»: development of infrastructure for bicycle tourism in the Lviv Region», «VeloKosiv», «Green Route», «EvroVelo» and others, which are accompanied by the development of infrastruc- ture and intensive development of bicycle tourism in the Carpathian region and its popularization among Ukrainian and foreign tourists. In general, the Carpathian region has great potential for the development of cycling tourism, and the territory of the Eastern Carpathians transboundary biosphere reserve has dozens of paved routes for cyclists of various levels of difficulty, ranging from easy infrastructure for beginners to difficult mountain routes for professionals. Most of the cycling routes are laid along the borders with Ukraine and Slovakia, some routes run through the territory of Poland and Slovakia, but none of them unites the territory of Ukraine, Poland, and Slovakia. Therefore, we propose to extend the cycle route SNINA-SŁOWAC- JA (Poland-Slovakia) to the Uzhan National Nature Park and unite the territories of three countries (Ukraine, Poland, and Slovakia) within the International Biosphere Reserve «Eastern Carpathians». In addition, to extend the Trasa Torfowisko Tarnawa–Błękitna Aleja cycle track on the territory of the «Sianu Valley» Landscape Park, which is also expedient to combine with the territory of the «Nadsyan» regional landscape park, located in the southwestern part of the Lviv region, within the Sambir district, near the border with Poland. Since the full-scale invasion of Russian troops on the territory of Ukraine, there are of course no safe places for recreation, however, it is relatively safe in the Carpathians, because it is far enough from the zone of active hostilities, there are no military facilities and critical infrastructure there. In general, almost all hiking and cycling routes and all types of active recreation are currently available in the Carpathians, and the spread of bicycle tourism, the construction of bicycle paths, and the development of new bicycle routes in the Carpathians will contribute to the formation of significant socio-economic and ecological advantages in the country.