An analysis on the effects of Air Transportation industry and the development of Religious Tourism (Case study: Mashhad Airport)

Religious tourism is one of the varieties of tourism that authorities in this filed، believe Iran، due to its special cultural and religious capacities and geographical position، has an important role in developing religious tourism industry. One of the important factors that affects industry tourism، especially developing the religious one، is the aerial transportation industry for the time being، regarding the importance of airports in transfering passengers، while being indurged in the existing economical، industrial and tourism problems. it is necessary to pay special attention to this industry and to have a deep survey on the role of airports in speeding the foretold activities. so in this article، by using information relevant to the number of internal travelers come in and went out of Mashhad Airport each moth (there are programmed flights from 13 different cities to Mashhad) during the years 1380-1395، grading the economical and industrial activities of these cities، and considering the number of tourists entered Mashhad airport and by using gravitation، regression and time serial models and also using Spss، itsm softwares، I have analysed the distance role factor in demanding to travel by air to Mashhad (regression model) and anticipating the number of travelers entering and going out of Mashhad during the years 1389 to 1393 (time seral model). Consequently، the above mentioned analysis shows that the most important factor in demanding to travel by air to Mashhad has been the distance between Mashhad and those cities.