DSA210 Term Project · Turkey Tourism · 2015–2025

Climate or Currency?

This project investigates why foreign tourists come to Turkey by comparing two explanations: climate and seasonality versus economic affordability. The analysis combines monthly arrivals, Istanbul and source-country temperatures, inflation, and exchange-rate data. The page below turns the report into an interactive country explorer: choose a source country and the results update instantly.

The key takeaway is not that economics is irrelevant. It is that the strongest single signal in monthly arrivals is climate/seasonality, while exchange rates and inflation add a second layer of economic explanation.

Central comparison
≈4×
Istanbul temperature explains more variance than Turkey CPI in aggregate monthly arrivals.
Climate R²
0.39
Approximate explanatory power of Istanbul temperature after excluding COVID years.
Classification
93%
High-season vs low-season months are highly learnable from the feature set.
Countries
10
Top source markets can be explored individually below.
How to read this dashboard

From report results to country stories

1

Pick a source country from the redesigned country selector.

2

See its strongest year, total-arrival rank, and peak months.

3

Read the H3 and H4 country-level tests with explanations of exactly what each hypothesis measures.

4

Use the EDA and ML interpretation cards to connect the country to the project conclusion.

Hypothesis map

H1–H7: formal labels, readable meanings

The project uses formal hypothesis codes because they make the report, notebooks, figures, and dashboard easy to cross-reference. Each code also has a plain-language meaning: what is being measured, which variables are compared, and what kind of result would support the hypothesis.

H1 — Istanbul temperature and total arrivals

Measures whether warmer Istanbul months coincide with higher total foreign arrivals. It captures the main climate/seasonality signal, including the summer holiday calendar.

H2 — Turkey price competitiveness and arrivals

Measures whether Turkey CPI, used as an affordability signal linked to Lira weakness, is associated with higher total arrivals.

H3 — Source-country inflation and arrivals

Measures whether inflation in a tourist's home country is related to arrivals from that same country. The direction can differ by country.

H4 — Temperature gap and escape-the-cold

Measures whether visitors arrive when Istanbul is warmer than home. Negative temperature-gap correlations support escape-the-cold behavior.

H5 — Climate versus economics

Compares how much variation is explained by Istanbul temperature versus Turkey CPI. This is the central project comparison.

H6–H7 — Timing and validation

H6 checks whether economic signals appear after a 1–6 month planning lag. H7 checks whether COVID-19 created a structural break in 2020–2021.

Interactive country explorer

Choose a country, then read its tourism signature

The selector is based on the report's top source-country list. Each card shows rank and peak timing before you click. After selection, the dashboard connects the country to the formal H1–H7 hypothesis structure while still explaining what each test actually measures.

Total-arrival rank
Among selected report countries.
Highest year
Peak months
Top three months by cumulative arrivals.

Monthly arrival pattern

Which months bring the selected country's tourists?

Yearly trend

Which year was strongest, and how does the decade look?

Country-level hypotheses

H3 measures whether inflation in the selected tourist's home country is associated with arrivals from that same country. H4 measures whether arrivals rise when Istanbul is warmer than the source country, which would support an escape-the-cold story.

H4 — Temperature gap / escape-the-cold result
What H4 measures: source-country temperature minus Istanbul temperature vs arrivals
H3 — Source-country inflation result
What H3 measures: home-country inflation vs arrivals from that country

EDA + ML interpretation

Quick comparison

Country cards at a glance

These mini cards are another way to navigate the project. Click a card to jump back to that country's full dashboard.

Dashboard data files

Where the country-profile inputs are stored

The interactive country explorer is designed to open directly on GitHub Pages, so the country profile values are embedded inside this HTML file. The exported CSV and JSON versions are stored in the repository under the processed data folder:

Country profile summary table

datasets/processed_data/country_profiles_summary_final.csv

Country profile dashboard data

datasets/processed_data/country_profiles_data_final.json

Standalone HTML/CSS/JavaScript dashboard for the DSA210 Turkey tourism project. Author: Tutku Sıla Baş