Prediction of the Spatial Structure of Cruise Market Based on Spatial Gravity Model—A Case Study of Shanghai Cruise Port

Spatial interaction between tourist origining region and destination is one of the key factors affecting tourism industry. Based on classical gravity models, this paper constructed a cruise market spatial gravity model to predict the cruise market demand. It is found that cruise tourism is rather and its elasticity is much higher than other tourism activities and cruise tourism is more easily to be replaced. Meanwhile the search index of cruise tourism in most regions is proportional to the overall tourism propensity, and the cruise tourism penetration rate decreases with distance from the cruise port studied. The largest market of Shanghai cruise tourism comes from the Yangtze River Delta region. Additionally, Cruise tourism and other tourism are positive correlated. Exotic cultures and the new modes of tourism are more attractive to tourists. However, the attraction for Midwest and North China and distance register a negative correlation with the share of the Shanghai cruise passenger market.