Tourist Motivation to Visit Padang’s Old Town Area in the Post-COVID-19 Pandemic Era

Abstract

The Oldtown of Padang is one of various potential historical tourist attractions, which is located on the edge of the West Coast of Sumatra. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the old city of Padang has been deserted by visitors. Since 2022 until now, the government of Padang city has opened the visitors to the oldtown tourist attraction. It is hoped being able to motivate potential tourists to visit Padang. The purpose of this study is to analyze the forms of Dutch Colonial heritage and cultural diversity that exist in the oldtown of Padang, as well as to find motivating factors for tourists to visit traces of the past in the oldtown of Padang. This study uses a qualitative-quantitative approach, with a SWOT analysis of tourist motivation in visiting the tourist attraction of Padang oldtown. The results of this study indicate that tourist motivation to visit the oldtown of Padang is influenced by internal and external factors regarding existing tourism products, both related to tourist attractions and supporting factors.