Without tourism York dies

ALL they think about is the tourists. This grumble is commonly heard in York whenever residents are fed up about litter in a suburban street, lack of decent housing, or seeing the city centre on a summer's afternoon filled with camera-clicking visitors who speak every language under the sun except English.

It may be common, but it is daft. Gillian Cruddas insists most of us don't realise just how much we owe to the four million or so visitors who come to York every year. Instead of resenting them, we should welcome them, and do all we can to make their stay enjoyable.

You would expect the head of York Tourism Bureau to say that. Gillian, however, comes armed with an impressive array of facts.

Visitors, she says, pump something like £300 million into the local economy every year. About 10,000 people in the city (ten per cent of York's workforce) are employed directly in tourism - whether as waiters, taxi drivers, hotel, museum or conference staff. And all of us reap the benefits.

Without the visitors and the money they bring, York would not have so many new bars and cafs; it would not have Gap, or Laura Ashley, or a big Marks & Spencer; it probably would not have the new City Screen cinema development.

And since all of those help to make York a modern and attractive place to live, the city probably would not have attracted the big new employers which have moved into the city in the past decade or so, including CCP or MAFF, providing much-needed jobs and a further boost to the economy.

"There are all kinds of spin-offs to a strong tourist industry," said Gillian. "If you create a city that attracts tourists, you are creating a city that is good to live in, and which encourages people to want to come and live here."

Andrew Scott, boss of the National Railway Museum and chairman of the York Tourism Bureau, goes further. Without tourists, he says, York would just be like any other small, isolated city with poor facilities - another Blackburn, perhaps.

"We all grumble when we trip over them in the street, and this is probably dangerous ground, but you could talk in terms of tourists subsidising the lifestyle of the York residents," he said.

Now is a good time to talk about the importance of tourism to York because it is 18 years this month since the first York Visitor and Conference Bureau - the precursor of today's tourism bureau - was set up. Tourism in this ancient and beautiful city has come of age.

York in 1987 was a different place to the city of today. There was no thriving hi-tech industry, no inward investment board actively seeking to encourage new employers to the city. York was still a chocolate and railways city, proud of its beauty, heritage and architecture but, despite the success of its university, perhaps not as well equipped as it might have been to take on the challenges of a changing world.

A leader in the Yorkshire Evening Press of October 8 1987 put it well: "Tourism, whether we like it or not, is a vital factor in York's economy. In recent years the narrow base of the city's economy, previously sheltered from the grim spectre of unemployment, has been starkly exposed. With the continuing fears for the future of British Rail Engineering Limited in the city, the promotion of tourism has become even more important."

Nevertheless, despite the success of the National Railway Museum (opened in 1975) and the Jorvik Viking Centre (opened in 1984), York had been sitting on its laurels, relying too much on its history and heritage to do the hard work of attracting tourists for it.

In the face of increasing competition from big industrial cities such as Manchester, Leeds and Sheffield - cities with much bigger resources and budgets than York, which were beginning to realise they had something to offer tourists themselves - the Viking city needed to get its act together.

When Paul Wells was appointed as the head of the newly created York Visitor and Conference Bureau in October 1987, he issued a timely warning: York's tourism economy was "teetering on the brink of decline," he said.

"Tourism is today's buzz-word and places such as Bradford and Wigan are promoting themselves and becoming successful. York has been resting on its laurels."

The Visitor and Conference Bureau was set up by the York Chamber of Trade to 'market' the city - attending conferences and travel fairs, inviting travel writers and tour operators to visit, and spreading the word about what a great place York was to visit.

Initially, there was an annual budget of £65,000 - and Mr Wells, who had been lured from Chester, where he did a similar job, had a staff of two in addition to himself.

Today, the York Tourism Bureau employs 42 people and has an annual turnover of about £1.7m.

There have been many highs and lows in terms of tourism in York over the past 18 years - the slumps in visitor numbers caused by September 11 and the great floods, for example, or the triumph of securing Royal Ascot. But in many ways the challenges the tourism bureau faces today - ensuring the city stays ahead of the game in an increasingly competitive tourism sector - remain the same as in 1987.

One of the biggest, says Gillian Cruddas, is finding ways different ways to 'sell' York to a wider range of visitors. People looking for a short break these days are just as likely to grab a cheap flight to Prague or Barcelona for the weekend as they are to think about coming to York. And cities such as Leeds and Manchester have big budgets to fund aggressive 'city break' promotional campaigns.

York has to find a way to compete. "So we have to make sure we offer value for money," said Gillian. "It is no good just saying this is a beautiful, historic city. We have to find different ways to make people want to come."

Festivals are a great way of doing that - hence the importance of the Food and Drink Festival, the Early Music Festival and this year's one-off Guy Fawkes celebration, Guy Fawkes 400. These bring visitors to the city at times that would otherwise be quiet - and also appeal to a different kind of visitor than those coming for the history.

Another big challenge is ensuring that when people do come, they have a good time. We all have a part to play in stepping up the welcome, Gillian says - and the York Pride campaign also helps. There are still too many visitors who complain about litter, vandalism and beggars.

But perhaps the biggest challenge of all is investment.

Andrew Scott points out that York is comparatively wealthy and is probably the only city in the north of England that does not qualify for Government or European regeneration funds - funds which could be ploughed into upgrading and improving the city's museums, galleries and other tourist attractions.

In the past few years, York has seen the £5million revamp of Jorvik and £4million spent at the NRM. The long process of upgrading the city's former 'municipal' museums - the Castle Museum, Yorkshire Museum and York Art Gallery - is also under way. But the money available pales in comparison to the Millennium and European cash made available to Sheffield for its Millennium Galleries, or the £28m invested in Leeds's city museum.

But if York is not to be left behind as a tourist destination by newer, brasher cities on its doorstep, the city needs to find the money from somewhere to re-invest in what makes it a great little place to visit.

"We've got this wonderful heritage," said Mr Scott. "But we have to find ways of continuing to reinvest in it to keep it attractive for the public."

If York doesn't do this, the city might one day find fewer camera-clicking visitors crowding the city's streets. And then we will realise how much we miss them.

York Tourism Bureau

The Tourism Bureau today is a private company, with 550 'member' organisations - hotels, guest-houses and tourist attractions in York and the area around. Turnover is £1.7million, money which comes from members, income generated from conference activities, and from the city council.

The city council originally dragged its feet when the York Visitor and Conference Bureau was set up in 1987, and the Chamber of Trade went it alone. In 1995, however, a partnership organisation, First Stop York, was set up with the city council, which is now fully committed to the bureau.

About half of the bureau's 42 staff work in the city's two tourist information centres (now being renamed Visitor Information Centres) at the de Grey Rooms and the railway station. The rest work on the conference desk, helping to organise conference venues for employers or other organisations wanting to hold conferences in the city, in marketing and promotion - attending travel fairs, organising visits by travel writers etc - and in admin.

Highs...

- Royal Ascot - a great advertisement for York and a great occasion

- Food and Drink Festival (and other regular York festivals) - a great way of bringing visitors to the city at times that are otherwise quiet

- ECOFIN conference - the 1999 meeting of international finance ministers in York was a great advert for York's potential as a conference city

Lows...

- The Great Floods - caused a slump in visitor numbers, mainly because people thought the floods were worse than they were

- September 11 - a big slump in overseas, particularly American, visitors

- Foot and mouth - although this affected rural areas of North Yorkshire more than York itself.

Updated: 10:22 Tuesday, October 11, 2005