Spatial heterogeneity and determinants of recreational vehicle and tent campsites in China: Insights from the OPGD model

The resurgence of camping tourism has integrated the pursuit of high-quality tourism development into the broader framework of Chinese-style modernization. This study constructs a dataset of campsite locations across 337 cities in China to analyze the spatial distribution of recreational vehicle and tent campsites. Using entropy weighting and the Optimal Parameters-based Geographical Detector model, it examines the driving factors. Key findings include the following: (1) Campsites cluster mostly on the eastern side of the Heihe-Tengchong line. Recreational vehicle campsites show a “multi center-clustered” pattern, while tent campsites exhibit shared clustering with recreational vehicle sites and a distinct “belted contiguous areas” pattern. (2) Government and policy heavily influence recreational vehicle campsites, whereas social and demographic factors are crucial for tent campsites. Shared location factors include proximity to city centers, roads, scenic areas, water bodies, and low-light-pollution zones. (3) Interaction effects analysis reveals that multifactor interactions, particularly in the government and policy environment, significantly impact campsite distributions.