Comparison of tourism trips before and during the COVID-19 epidemic by using data from websites

Leto 2020 je močno zaznamovala epidemija koronavirusne bolezni COVID-19. Posledice epidemije se odražajo na velikem številu področij. V eno izmed njih spada tudi področje turizma in turističnih potovanj. V sklopu magistrskega dela smo se osredotočili na področje turizma, kjer smo primerjali turistična potovanja pred in med epidemijo koronavirusne bolezni COVID-19. Turistična spletna mesta, kot so TripAdvisor, vsebujejo in prikazujejo komentarje, ocene in izkušnje turistov o obiskih različnih turističnih atrakcij. Za potrebo analize vpliva epidemije smo s spletnim zajemom zbrali podatke o vseh turističnih atrakcijah za države: Slovenija, Madžarska, Avstrija, Hrvaška ter Italija. Namen analize je poiskati ključna področja, na katera so epidemija - oz. ukrepi za zajezitev le-te - še posebej vplivali. To smo storili z uporabo različnih metodologij, kot so uporaba grafa sočasnih pojavitev, primerjava podatkov z različnimi vizualizacijami in iskanje najmočnejših turističnih tokov. Pri slednjem smo se osredotočili na prehode med atrakcijami, regijami ter državami na mesečni ravni. Rezultati primerjave turističnih potovanj pred in med epidemijo kažejo, da je epidemija povzročila znatno zmanjšanje potovanj do znanih in najbolj pogosto obiskanih lokacij in hkrati povzročila rahlo spremembo obiska določenega tipa lokacij.The year 2020 was strongly marked by the COVID-19 coronavirus disease epidemic. The consequences of the epidemic are reflected in a large number of areas. One of them is the field of tourism and tourist trips. As part of the master\u27s thesis, we focused on the field of tourism, where we compared tourist trips before and during the epidemic of the COVID-19 coronavirus disease. Tourist sites such as TripAdvisor contain and display comments, ratings, and experiences of tourists about visiting various tourist attractions. To analyze the impact of the epidemic, we collected data on all tourist attractions for the countries: Slovenia, Hungary, Austria, Croatia, and Italy. The purpose of the analysis is to find the key areas to which the epidemic has affected the most. We did this by using a variety of methodologies such as using a graph of simultaneous occurrences, comparing data with different visualizations, and finding the strongest tourism flows. In the latter, we focused on transitions between attractions, regions, and countries on a monthly basis. The results of the comparison of tourist trips before and during the epidemic show that the epidemic resulted in a significant reduction in trips to well-known and most frequently visited locations and at the same time caused a slight change in visits to a certain type of location