Tourism operating environment in Helsinki

The city’s tourism infrastructure, or operating environment, is an important part of the city’s ability to provide services. Areas for development include destination-level visitor experience, tourists' different forms of transportation, and the services they require in urban infrastructure. The Tourist and Destination Management Unit is developing a more functional visitor experience and increasing Helsinki's attractiveness in accordance with the Tourism and Events Programme 2022–2026.

Tourist bus services 

The demand for tourist bus services has grown in recent years due to the tourism growth. The Tourist Bus Service Development Plan (pdf, in Finnish) has been prepared for Helsinki’s tourist bus services. It includes a comprehensive examination of the current situation, identification of development needs and solutions proposals, such as international mapping. The objective of the development is to provide tourists with easy alternative modes of transport to explore the city and ensure smooth tourist bus services for the appropriate target groups to see Helsinki.

See also the stops and parking places for tourist buses in Helsinki in 2023.

Public toilets 

The need for new public toilets has been identified. The number of public toilets has already been increased and more are on the way. Sibelius Park, for example, has a new public toilet in addition to the old one. Cleaning of the public toilets at Sibelius Park has been increased during the summer season due to the high number of users. More information on the development of public toilets can be read in Jukka Punamäki's blog post Tourism and Toilets 2020(Link leads to external service) (in Finnish).

Guidance 

In the City Guidance Ecosystem project, Helsinki, Tampere and Turku developed their guidance together with companies and interest groups through a shared innovation platform. The project ended in 2019 and resulted in the concept of smart city guidance and the joint city guidance handbook for the 6Aika cities. The new Smart City Guidance in Helsinki project was launched in 2021.