Boosterism - is it always desirable?

Last week Visit York - the body responsible for promoting tourism in York - announced plans  to more than double the value of the industry to £1 billion in the coming decade or so. There is much talk of hitting high-spending market segments such as the growing Chinese market, the usually dependable US market and also business travellers.

On the face of it, there is nothing wrong in being ambitious but I am particularly concerned at what some of the negative impacts of such growth might bring. Latest figures I have seen suggest that annual hotel occupancy in York is around 80% which is certainly higher than the UK national average.  Thus there is already limited capacity to accommodate a significant growth in overnight tourists as there is nowhere for them to stay for much of the time.  Is our product really so attractive that we can attract significant numbers of international visitors in the damp rainy days of February or on cold November evenings, which is when there is some bedspace capacity.  And if we are going to build additional hotels to accommodate more overnight visitors in the peak summer months, where will these be? There is nowhere within the historic core available to build a sizeable new hotel.  Plans are in place for a hotel as part of the multi-use development at the old Terry’s factory off the Bishopthorpe Road but any additional hotel developments are likely to eat into the green belt.  So is it possible that future tourism growth may bring with it further development pressures that, if accommodated, may diminish some of the appeal of this wonderful historic city (which as the photo below shows, I've been visiting for more than 50 years!).

Visit York are of course being canny, in that included in the target revenue figure of £1 billion are the hundreds of millions of pounds already earned from day visitors. And as anyone who has ever been Christmas shopping in York knows, the city is already a magnet for retail tourism. Within the coming months a new John Lewis store will open on the outskirts of the city at Monk's Cross, but will that be enough to compete with the new Trinity Centre in Leeds with its 120 shops and mix of entertainment and eating venues? Or will there be pressure to build more in and around York, to compete for this segment? Once again, I wonder whether there is the physical capacity to accommodate a significant increase in day visitors (for it is certain that all the hoped-for growth will not be delivered by overnight tourism alone).  City centre parking gets full very early and the park and rides are often operating close to capacity at peak periods. Whilst there is a new park and ride facility close to completion out on the Tadcaster Road, will we need even more investment in public transport infrastructure? And again, if so, where will it go? Will we lose more green belt?

York already has a thriving though at times troublesome nightime economy. As research by my colleague Stuart Moss has shown, the economic role of this aspect of the leisure industry can be very significant in urban destinations. But it also brings with it problems. The Micklegate Run is already notorious for the challenges it brings to local business and residents, and sadly the tragic implications of young people who have enjoyed an evening drinking in a riverside location are being played out as I write with the search in the River Ouse for Megan Roberts , who is presumed to have fallen into the river accidentally whilst under the influence of alcohol.

Both extraordinary policing events such as this, as well as scheduled investment like the increased police presence required at York Station from late afternoons most Saturdays where there is a need to manage large groups of people coming into the city for a night out, bring with them very real financial costs to local communities.  And this is one aspect of tourism that is too rarely considered in the media.  With all the emphasis on the positive side (increased revenue for local businesses, new jobs created or existing jobs saved) there is too little attention paid to the impacts of tourism on the many people in the host community who bear the brunt of the negatives and who see little of the positive benefit.

Yesterday the historian Bettany Hughes presented a delightful programme on the history of hospitality as a concept, reminding us that evolved initially as a tradition of mutual respect between host and guest.  Are Visit York perhaps in danger of skewing the relationship too much away from the local community?