City Break Motivation: the Case of Dublin, a Successful National Capital

This paper investigates why people take city break trips. The main objective of the study was to reveal the underlying push and pull motivational factors associated with taking a city break holiday to Dublin. In-depth interviews with 40 city break visitors uncovered six push factors and eight pull factors. The main push motives involved were, ‘escape,’ ‘socialising,’ and ‘self esteem (gift giving).’ City breaks were generally viewed as active or ‘doing’ holidays, with the ‘relaxation’ motive hardly featuring at all as a reason to visit. Pull factors were found to be particularly important in terms of the travel decision. Factors such as, ease of access and, the availability of cheap flights, were not only influential in determining the destination, but also acted, in some cases, as the main stimuli to take the trip