Cycling Tourism and Revitalization in the Sicilian Hinterland: A Case Study in the Taormina–Etna District

This study aims to present a strategy for the revitalization of the Sicilian “internal ar-eas”, recognizing a directional tool, together with the integration of self-centered actions of slowtourism. The design was specifically located in the Taormina–Etna tourist district (an area of north-eastern Sicily that includes 60 municipalities) which, in rethinking the post-pandemic restart, aims atthe development of a mobile system of cycling tourism able to interconnect cultural peculiarities,environmental characteristics, and landscape values. This paper also examines key features andinterpretations, and develops a strategy based on a slow travel framework as an alternative means ofachieving success in the Sicilian hinterland. Starting from the current financial and environmental cri-sis, therefore, the paper finds explanations and solutions, in which we try to conceive ofthe economyand ecology as systems that not only open to one another, but mutually determine one another indefining new, self-sustaining local development processes. In order to build a competitive alternativeto help less favorable regions, it is necessary to move within the scope of investments by a publicsystem capable of planning resilient strategies based on sustainable principles.