The Lucca Comics and Games Festival as a platform for transformational cultural tourism: Evidence from the perceptions of residents

There is ample literature on residents’ perceptions of the costs and benefits of tourism activities. Much less attention has been provided to residents’ perceptions of transformational cultural events redefining local identity and tourism demand. We examine one such case study, the Lucca Comics and Games (LCAG), whose interest also derives from the fact that Lucca is an established Italian heritage city, with relevant attraction capacity for traditional heritage tourism. We have administered a questionnaire to a sample of the local population (411 interviews), with high educational and cultural access levels. We find that LCAG-related tourism is perceived to have differential impact with respect to tourism in general on several dimensions of interest, both in terms of perceived costs and benefits, also as an effect of cognitive biases. Our results provide interesting implications in terms of the role of transformational cultural events such as LCAG in driving change in heritage cities.