ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Water
Sec. Water and Human Systems
This article is part of the Research TopicMainstreaming Sociohydrology: Towards Designing and Implementing Management InterventionsView all 4 articles
Water-centered ecotourism planning: ecohydrological capacity and institutional barriers in a semiarid metropolis
Provisionally accepted
Parisa Kooshki1
Hassan Esmaeilzadeh1*
Shahindokht Bargh Jelveh1
Azade Deljouei2Marina Viorela Marcu3
Seyed Mohammad Moein Sadeghi2- 1Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran
- 2Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, United States
- 3Universitatea Transilvania din Brasov, Brașov, Romania
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Balancing ecotourism development with water resource sustainability is an urgent challenge for semiarid cities experiencing escalating water stress. Tehran, a rapidly expanding Middle Eastern metropolis, has faced acute water scarcity in recent years, making water-centered planning critical for sustainable tourism. This study combines ecological capability evaluation (ECE), GIS-based multi-criteria analysis, and institutional review to delineate suitable zones for ecotourism. Twenty-three indicators across physical, ecohydrological, and socio-economic dimensions were weighted using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP) and integrated through Weighted Linear Combination (WLC). Results showed a clear spatial polarization: northern highlands and river valleys, with higher precipitation and abundant surface water, were identified as the most suitable areas for both intensive and extensive ecotourism, while southern plains with chronic water scarcity and flood risk were classified as unsuitable. More than 60% of intensive ecotourism zones are located within one kilometer of perennial rivers, underscoring the decisive role of surface water. Extensive ecotourism suitability was more strongly associated with upland regions combining groundwater accessibility and higher rainfall. This study shows that water is not merely a limiting resource but the strategic axis around which ecotourism planning in semiarid cities must be organized. The framework developed here provides a decision-support tool for Tehran and offers transferable guidance for semiarid metropolitan regions confronting water scarcity and uncoordinated land-use expansion.
Keywords: Ecological Carrying Capacity (ECC), Institutional and organizational cooperation, Iran, Land-use planning, Sustainable ecotourism
Received: 25 Aug 2025; Accepted: 15 Dec 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Kooshki, Esmaeilzadeh, Bargh Jelveh, Deljouei, Marcu and Sadeghi. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Hassan Esmaeilzadeh
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