Abstract:
Tourism is obviously a large income earner in Sri Lanka. Railway tourism is one of the main categories of tourism where people can use train as a transportation method. In Sri Lanka main railway line (Colombo fort – Badulla) is possibly the largest tourists travelling railway line due to its scenic surrounding. Therefore the research is based on the satisfaction of international tourists towards railway tourism in Sri Lanka. The research problem is “Are the international tourists satisfied with railway tourism in Sri Lanka?” The main objective of the research is to find the overall satisfaction of international tourists towards railway tourism in Sri Lanka. The other objectives of the research are to find the impact of “Age, Gender and Region” on the overall satisfaction of international tourists towards railway tourism in Sri Lanka and to find the concurrence between factors of satisfaction towards the preference of railway tourism to other modes of tourism transport. The target population of the research is all the international tourists who travel by train in Sri Lanka and the sample is 120 out of all the international tourists travel by main line. Convenience sampling method used to select the sample. Primary data was collected using questionnaires from international tourists. Data is analyzed using SPSS and MS Excel software through Chi- Square tests, Kendall test and Descriptive statistics methods. Research reveals that European tourists use train to travel in Sri Lanka mostly, the tourists of age category 20 to 35 years are willing railway tourism the most, natural beauty is one of the main reasons that international tourists choose main railway line to travel by train, sanitary facilities, water arrangements and entertaining facilities must be developed and international tourists use the night mail train the least as a transportation method on their journeys. The Chi-square test proves that, there is a considerable impact of “Age, Gender and Region” on the overall satisfaction of international tourists towards railway tourism in Sri Lanka and, Kendall test proves that, there is a concurrence between factors of satisfaction towards the preference of railway tourism to other modes of tourism transport. Therefore it can be concluded that, the overall satisfaction of tourists is “Moderate”.
