Visitor centres in Victoria and other sa国际传媒 vacation hotspots are seeing fewer tourists, and it could be because more people are doing their travel research online or on their smartphones.
Victoria鈥檚 centre logged 229,000 visitors in 2004 and 144,000 in 2012. Visitors to Sidney鈥檚 visitor centre fell from 36,000 in 2004 to 16,500 in 2012.
Total visitors to centres in the province have fallen from 3.27 million in 2004 to 2.73 million in 2012. July totals this year were 529,000, compared to 709,000 in 2004.
The declines have been relatively steady, before and after the financial downturn in 2008.
Some analyses suggest that smartphones and other mobile devices give travellers so much basic information at their fingertips, they don鈥檛 have to go searching. Wendy Nordin, manager of policy initiatives for Prince George, cited the abundance of web sources when she successfully argued for closing one of two centres in the city, rather than refurbishing it.
While fewer tourists are flocking to visitor centres in Greater Victoria, they are still flocking to the region. Tourism numbers for July are higher than last year, with hotel occupancy up 1.68 per cent over July 2012.
Most of them have smartphones or tablets in hand when they want to find a place to eat or get directions to their hotel.
Visitor centres will have to take a close look at how they operate. They might have to change their focus, to emphasize not just maps and brochures, but personalized local knowledge that is harder to find online.
We shouldn鈥檛 care where tourists get their information about Victoria, as long as they get the information they need to enjoy their visit. And come back.
