Impressions to the European Fortress Summer 2018

46 www.forte-cultura.eu Fortress monuments have a very high tourism potential, but to date only few of them be- nefit. They are already active in many places, but mostly only locally/ regionally touristically networked and integrated but also often left to themselves. Only the „towers“ are visible on the tourist market, such as the Hohensalzburg (AT), Lu- xemburg (LU), Malta (MT), Alhambra (ES), Malbork (PL), Fort Gaillard (FR) or Gibraltar (GI). 90% of the fortress monuments in Europe are little known, not present in the tourism mar- ket FORTE CULTURA® and suffer from chronic underfunding, burden on the municipal and national budgets and have low sources of in- come. The European Cultural Route fortress monu- ments- FORTE CULTURA® is a European brand for the fortress tourism. FORTE CULTURA® markets the versatile „architectura militaris“ with its rich world of experience at national and transnational level. It causes a higher perception of fortress mo- numents, mobilizes tourists, balances over- and under-represented monuments and ex- pands the sphere of activity of local actors. The associated European fortress tourism and fortress marketing network unites experts ac- ross sectors and ensures close cooperation, knowledge transfer, joint (funding) projects and innovation. The cultural route FORTE CULTURA® is an in- strument for qualitative fortress tourism with new perspectives also for the pan-European area. It can be used to capitalize on cultural heritage fortress monuments, open up new sources of income and funding for fortresses, preserve or create jobs, and improve monu- ment economics. Travelling to the fascinating Art of Architecture FORTE CULTURA® E uropean C ultural R oute F ortified M onuments