Saturation Point in High-grade Tourist Travel
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'4I1' appears probable that we are approaching saturation point in that part of the market which is concerned with first-class travel, and the future increment will come in the main from lower income groups." Mr. E. L. Taylor, an executive of the British Electric Traction Co., Ltd., and deputy chairman of the British Travel. and Holidays Association, made this forecast in a paper on "Transport and the Tourist Industry," which ire read to the Institute of Transport, in London. on . Monday.
"These newcomers," he added. " will
be progressively more sensitive to cost: but consider what a lot of them theft are—what a vast new potential there will be if the cost can be brought to meet it."
Earlier, Mr. Taylor had discussed the need for spreading the holiday season. He said that the concentration of holiday traffic during July and August had assumed critical dimensions. It' would be worth while, he thought, for the holiday trades to study ways of increasing the oil-season differential in cost, to encourage staggering.
About 22m. people resident in this country took summer holidays away from home, but within Great Britain. and the internal movement probably cost over £350m. a year. Preliminary estimates for 1951 indicated that some 700.0013 foreign visitors were received in Great Britain, and made a gross contribution to the national economy exceeding £100m. Of that sum, £14m. was estimated to have been spent on internal transport. — Mr. Taylor said that in many European countries, including Britain, the tourist industry ranked high in the list of 'export trades, but governments often took .decisions with little or no regard for their impact on tourism.
International co-operatAt had made useful progress since 1946, The International Union of Official Tourist -t-jrganio.ttions had been reconstituted
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and strengthened, with consultative status under the L'-nited Nations Organization. Much good work had already brought about big reductions in visa requirements and other 'travel barriers. In recent months, steps had been taken to co-ordinate irtternational express coach services on the Continent.
• In. 1950, much less than half the visitors from the U.S.A. to Europe came to Britain. Nevertheless, Britain's tourist trade, expressed in terms el "tourist nights," was higher than that of Switzerland and Italy, and was exceeded only by France.
Much useful work in inducio2 visitors to come to Britain had been done by the British Travel and Holidays Association, which, in the year ended March 31, 1951, spent £524,456 en overseas publicity and other projects..
Despite Britain's growing tourist trade, Mr. Taylor said that the Association was neither complacent nor smisfied.
." We are not satisfied with the numbers of tourists we get, nor_with the resources we are afforded to promote the traffic,"-he said. "We believe that a large expansion of those resources would enable us to produce much better results, and that these ;milts could be achieved with much less strain on the national economy than equivalent values in any manufacturing export trade. Transport—by sea, air, rail and road—is the largest component of the tourist industry, with the greatest contribution to make and the greatest benefit to derive,"