From streets to screens: A deep dive into urban configuration and Google reviews

The experiences of urban visitors are frequently captured and shared on various websites and social platforms through reviews and ratings. These "digital footprints" help us understand what visitors think about a certain place. High visitor traffic may stem from the urban layout and configuration, such as the importance of a street, the building characteristic, or the location of the place within an urban settlement. Hence, these digital footprints are shaped by a complex interplay of spatial, emotional, self-organizational, and socio-behavioural factors. This presents us with compelling research questions: To what extent does urban configuration influence these digital footprints? And how exactly does this dynamic play out? This research examines the intricate relationship between urban spatial characteristics and digital footprints in the realm of urban tourism. Our approach taps into Space Syntax metrics and associates them with places, extracted as points of interest from Google Maps API. This framework helps ascertain what is the linkage between urban configuration and visitors’ digital activities, to reveal another layer of social behaviour within the cities. Our research centred on the historic city of Sassi di Matera, Italy, distinguished by its cave dwellings and intricate pathways. Initial findings from our research present significant correlations between Space Syntax metrics and visitors’ reviewing activities at specific places. By correlating the configurational patterns with reviews and ratings, we observed that these places are influenced by surrounding space, and that this situation varies depending on the type of place.