Join us
Orange welcome sign that reads Royal Geographical Society with IBG.

Become a member and discover where geography can take you.

Join us

Key words

  • Alpine

  • Glaciers

  • Retreat

  • Landslides

  • 3D modelling

  • Landscape change

  • Geospatial data

  • Heritage

  • Climate change

  • Extreme

  • Spatial perception

  • Tourism

Summary

Undertaking a grand tour became a popular pastime for the upper classes of British society in the seventeenth century. Often travelling across Europe sometimes for a number of years, the tour was designed to provide a formative experience in which these relatively inexperienced young men and (occasionally) women sought scientific insight, faced new cultures and created art based on the new landscapes in which they found themselves.

Scrolling forward four hundred years, The ‘Grand Alpine Tour’, undertaken in the summer of 2014, encompassed a six thousand mile journey through some of the Alps’ toughest terrain for a team of three British academics. Following in their historical tourists’ footsteps Mark Allan, Dr Mike Lim and Thomas Shaw, all from Northumbria University, looked to explore the magnitude, frequency and spatial distribution of landslides above thinning and retreating glaciers in the region. Using the Society’s extensive historic archive of Alpine based resources the team compared historical data with that of modern times, collecting the latter through new and exciting methods. The team also sought to use both data sets to examine how the Alps have been perceived and portrayed by different cultural groups over time.

Key topics and themes

  • The indicators of glacial retreat in Alpine regions

  • How the processes that create landslides inform wider understanding of Alpine environments

  • The challenge of living and working in Alpine environments

  • The factors that continue to draw people to the Alps, as researchers and as tourists

  • How different groups, both from and visiting the region, perceive the Alpine environment and culture

  • Comparing how the Alps has been portrayed through history in a visual form

The researchers

The team consisted of three British academics: Mark Allan, Dr Mike Lim and Thomas Shaw, all from Northumbria University

The Grand Alpine Tour is funded by the Land Rover / RGS-IBG ‘Go Beyond’ Bursary, an annual award given to an expedition that pushes boundaries and encourages a greater interest in Geography.

Downloads

File nameFiles

File type

Size

Download

Grand Alpine Tour Final Report

.pdf

1 MB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 Convention on Sustainable Tourism Handout

.pdf

134 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 Convention on Sustainable Tourism Handout (1)

.doc

810 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 Introducing the Grand Tour Handout

.doc

1 MB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 Introducing the Grand Tour Handout (1)

.pdf

293 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 Introducing the Grand Tour Presentation

.ppt

2 MB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 Living Butler Model Handout

.doc

96 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 Living Butler Model Handout (1)

.pdf

28 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 Living Butler Model Presentation

.ppt

249 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 More about the Butler Model Handout

.doc

462 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 More about the Butler Model Handout (1)

.pdf

237 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 More information about the Grand Tour and Tourists

.pdf

494 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 More information about the Grand Tour and Tourists (1)

.doc

1 MB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 SWOT Analysis Handout

.doc

604 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 1 SWOT Analysis Handout (1)

.pdf

104 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 2 How are we linked to our environment Handout

.pdf

496 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 2 How are we linked to our environment Handout (1)

.doc

1 MB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 2 Collecting Data in the Alps Presentation

.ppt

682 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 2 Comparing Directions of the Alps Presentation

.ppt

2 MB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 2 Designing a piece of fieldwork in the Alps Presentation

.ppt

1 MB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 2 Field Experiment Handout

.pdf

223 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 2 Field Experiment Handout (1)

.doc

465 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 3 Aosta Valley's Landslides Presentation

.pdf

1 MB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 3 Introducing the Aosta Valley Handout

.pdf

153 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 3 Introducing the Aosta Valley Handout (1)

.doc

502 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 3 More Information about Landslides Handout

.doc

946 KB

Grand Alpine Tour Lesson 3 More Information about Landslides Handout (1)

.pdf

345 KB

Download all files