Digital Access to Restricted Sacred Heritage: Implications for Urban Tourism Planning

Gender-based restrictions in sacred heritage spaces challenge inclusive urban tourism planning. This study examines digital access at the Silver Ubosot in Chiang Mai, Thailand, where women cannot enter the sacred interior. An on-site quasi-experiment with 135 first-time female visitors compared VR360, immersive virtual reality (iVR), and AI-driven iVR. Compared with VR360, both immersive approaches were associated with significantly higher presence, engagement, and perceived substitution, but AI-iVR did not significantly outperform iVR. Substitution scores remained below the scale midpoint across conditions, indicating limited acceptance of virtual experiences as replacements for physical visitation. Visit intention did not differ significantly between groups. Parallel mediation analysis identified significant direct effects of both immersive approaches on substitution, but no significant indirect effects through presence or engagement. Greater immersion therefore does not necessarily make virtual access an adequate substitute for physical visitation. Digital access should be selected according to visitor needs, cultural protocols, interpretive goals, and operational capacity rather than technological sophistication alone. Less resource-intensive approaches may offer a practical option for providing digital access, while the additional benefits of AI-supported systems require further evaluation. Overall, digital access offers a complementary approach to experiencing restricted sacred heritage rather than a replacement for physical visitation.