Do you live in a tourist hot spot?
Discussion
juice said:
bloomen said:
I've noticed that the one place you can almost guarantee to be nailed by traffic on the M5 is ALWAYS Weston. It's almost as inevitable as the sun coming up every morning.
It's a PITA as I love taking my dogs to Sand Bay !
PurpleTurtle said:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Cornwall
The Cornish economy also depends heavily on its successful tourist industry which contributes 24% of Cornwall's GDP and supports about 1 in 5 jobs. Tourism contributed £1.85 billion to the Cornish economy in 2011
Cornwall is one of the poorest areas in the United Kingdom with a GVA of 70.9% of the national average in 2015
We’ll go home if you really want, but you’ll be screwed.
Try living with it day on day.The Cornish economy also depends heavily on its successful tourist industry which contributes 24% of Cornwall's GDP and supports about 1 in 5 jobs. Tourism contributed £1.85 billion to the Cornish economy in 2011
Cornwall is one of the poorest areas in the United Kingdom with a GVA of 70.9% of the national average in 2015
We’ll go home if you really want, but you’ll be screwed.
Tourist season in Cornwall starts at Easter and goes non stop all the way through to the end of October and then starts again over Christmas and New year.
Lucky if we get 3 months of peace and quite per year.
Trust me, by the end of July, I am ready to murder the next white socked, sandal wearing, sunburnt, overweight, caravan dwelling northerner who gets in the way of me trying to go about my business and get to bloody work.!
Why do tourists insist on travelling around at rush hour 8am, in the morning on there sight seeing trips when us locals are trying to get to work and get there on time.?
You have all day....
Oh, and PLEASE TAKE YOU RUBBISH HOME WITH YOU.
That includes now punctured inflatable sea toys, disposable barbeques, cheap plastic tat purchased for the kids, now broken and discarded on the beach, empty beer bottles and cans, and wet wipes left everywhere.
PLEEEASSE, Tidy up after yourselves and respect the environment you are visiting and the people who live and work here and we will get along just fine for the duration of your visit.
Edited by Mexman on Tuesday 16th April 20:56
Mexman said:
PurpleTurtle said:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Cornwall
The Cornish economy also depends heavily on its successful tourist industry which contributes 24% of Cornwall's GDP and supports about 1 in 5 jobs. Tourism contributed £1.85 billion to the Cornish economy in 2011
Cornwall is one of the poorest areas in the United Kingdom with a GVA of 70.9% of the national average in 2015
We’ll go home if you really want, but you’ll be screwed.
Try living with it day on day.The Cornish economy also depends heavily on its successful tourist industry which contributes 24% of Cornwall's GDP and supports about 1 in 5 jobs. Tourism contributed £1.85 billion to the Cornish economy in 2011
Cornwall is one of the poorest areas in the United Kingdom with a GVA of 70.9% of the national average in 2015
We’ll go home if you really want, but you’ll be screwed.
Tourist season in Cornwall starts at Easter and goes non stop all the way through to the end of October and then starts again over Christmas and New year.
Lucky if we get 3 months of peace and quite per year.
Trust me, by the end of July, I am ready to murder the next white socked, sandal wearing, sunburnt, overweight, caravan dwelling northerner who gets in the way of me trying to go about my business and get to bloody work.!
Why do tourists insist on travelling around at rush hour in the morning on there sight seeing trips when us locals are trying to get to work and get there on time?
Disrespectful.
And no, I will not be screwed thank you.
maybe move? It’s never going to change and you seem very angry about the people who help considerably in the income of up your part of the country. 
p1stonhead said:
maybe move? It’s never going to change and you seem very angry about the people who help considerably in the income of up your part of the country. The only place that seems to be up to meeting the demands of an ever increasing influx of visitors is Mecca but they seem to have no qualms about demolishing everything.
Elsewhere I guess the locals are stuck with the creaking infrastructure.
Edited by bloomen on Tuesday 16th April 21:08
bloomen said:
If I were forced to move to Glenrothes just for the sake of a bearable life I wouldn't be best pleased.
The only place that seems to be up to meeting the demands of an ever increasing influx of visitors is Mecca but they seem to have no qualms about demolishing everything.
Elsewhere I guess the locals are stuck with the creaking infrastructure.
Ironically, in the case of many tourist hotspots, it is the "creaking infrastructure" that attracts the visitors. I doubt there'd be people queuing up to visit Mousehole or St Ives if they demolished them, and started again with modern hi-tech, low-emissions buildings and wide boulevards with plenty of space for all road users to get about and park. It's the narrow roads in these sorts of places that contribute to their character. Without them, and the quaint (but tiny) cottages, there'd be no reason to holiday there. I grew up at the edge of the Gower peninsula and it was always comparatively chock-a-block with tourists. It's just that now there are far more people living in the UK and so even if the same proportion of the population go on holiday to a "hotspot", the actual number is far greater. And while we keep building new towns and villages, or expanding the ones we have, there is a finite number of desirable holiday destinations, so the ones we have will just keep on getting busier and busier until they become so damnably unpleasant that people stop going there.The only place that seems to be up to meeting the demands of an ever increasing influx of visitors is Mecca but they seem to have no qualms about demolishing everything.
Elsewhere I guess the locals are stuck with the creaking infrastructure.
I'm in the process of buying a house in Bournemouth, which is traffic hell at the moment with the work going on on the A338. But there are plenty of roads on which you can get about locally without the tourist traffic having all that great an impact. Plus I'm moving to an area more than 2 miles from the beach and of no interest to a holidaymaker. Yet I'll have a virtually traffic-free walk/cycle ride which will get me to the beach in 40 minutes (walk) or 15 minutes (ride) and has direct access into really quiet countryside when heading inland. As with many tourist destinations, if you can read a map and know not to follow the brown direction signs to visitor attractions, then there is almost always somewhere to park, and a quieter way to get there.
yellowjack said:
And while we keep building new towns and villages, or expanding the ones we have, there is a finite number of desirable holiday destinations, so the ones we have will just keep on getting busier and busier until they become so damnably unpleasant that people stop going there.
This is a very good point and one that hadn't fully occurred to me.As publicity and knowledge about places grows the pressure builds up. More nationalities will get richer and want to hit the same places too.
No one ever arrived at Heathrow demanding the way to Stevenage.
MikeDB1 said:
AC43 said:
GetCarter said:
AC43 said:
and the now ubiquitous scamera vans. Only a fun crushing mean spirited miserablist like wee krankie could come with those policies and enforce them so vigorously.
Not round here... no fixed cameras and I have seen perhaps three police cars in 21 years. (Nearest staffed police station is now offshore on Skye!)Maybe if you live here It's very different of course.
At the prizegiving he even had a list of the speeds everyone had gone past him at. He told me off for only doing 93mph as I instinctively braked far too late on seeing a jam sandwich at the side of the road. The highest was 128 in a Manta 400 :-)
I suppose that when I was bombing around Skye, Mull and the west coast mainland back in the 80's there were a relatively tiny number of visitors and they were in far less powerful cars. In my case a string of 95 and 105bhp Alfas and the odd stint in a GTV6.
These days the visitor numbers are vastly higher (thanks to the publicity of the NC500 and so on) and often in convoys of cars with 300-500bhp. So maybe plod has a point.
AC43 said:
LOL.
I suppose that when I was bombing around Skye, Mull and the west coast mainland back in the 80's there were a relatively tiny number of visitors and they were in far less powerful cars. In my case a string of 95 and 105bhp Alfas and the odd stint in a GTV6.
These days the visitor numbers are vastly higher (thanks to the publicity of the NC500 and so on) and often in convoys of cars with 300-500bhp.
Definitely far far less visitors in the 80s ! I went to Mull in the summer with one of the then new VHS cameras set up in an RS2000 and videoed the whole of Mull so I could memorize the rally route rather than rely just on pacenotes and we hardly met another vehicle over the whole three days. Nowadays you're not allowed to pre-inspect a route, but if you were I'm sure any video would just be full of camper vans and you'd never get enough information on the road itself.I suppose that when I was bombing around Skye, Mull and the west coast mainland back in the 80's there were a relatively tiny number of visitors and they were in far less powerful cars. In my case a string of 95 and 105bhp Alfas and the odd stint in a GTV6.
These days the visitor numbers are vastly higher (thanks to the publicity of the NC500 and so on) and often in convoys of cars with 300-500bhp.
Mexman said:
PurpleTurtle said:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Cornwall
The Cornish economy also depends heavily on its successful tourist industry which contributes 24% of Cornwall's GDP and supports about 1 in 5 jobs. Tourism contributed £1.85 billion to the Cornish economy in 2011
Cornwall is one of the poorest areas in the United Kingdom with a GVA of 70.9% of the national average in 2015
We’ll go home if you really want, but you’ll be screwed.
Try living with it day on day.The Cornish economy also depends heavily on its successful tourist industry which contributes 24% of Cornwall's GDP and supports about 1 in 5 jobs. Tourism contributed £1.85 billion to the Cornish economy in 2011
Cornwall is one of the poorest areas in the United Kingdom with a GVA of 70.9% of the national average in 2015
We’ll go home if you really want, but you’ll be screwed.
Tourist season in Cornwall starts at Easter and goes non stop all the way through to the end of October and then starts again over Christmas and New year.
Lucky if we get 3 months of peace and quite per year.
Trust me, by the end of July, I am ready to murder the next white socked, sandal wearing, sunburnt, overweight, caravan dwelling northerner who gets in the way of me trying to go about my business and get to bloody work.!
Why do tourists insist on travelling around at rush hour 8am, in the morning on there sight seeing trips when us locals are trying to get to work and get there on time.?
You have all day....
Oh, and PLEASE TAKE YOU RUBBISH HOME WITH YOU.
That includes now punctured inflatable sea toys, disposable barbeques, cheap plastic tat purchased for the kids, now broken and discarded on the beach, empty beer bottles and cans, and wet wipes left everywhere.
PLEEEASSE, Tidy up after yourselves and respect the environment you are visiting and the people who live and work here and we will get along just fine for the duration of your visit.
Edited by Mexman on Tuesday 16th April 20:56
Your local council makes a pretty penny out of business rates from myriad tourist businesses. If they aren't factoring in the (admittedly annoying) clean up costs of said tourism then they need to get better accountants. It's like people moaning about all the camping equipment left behind at festivals - highly annoying, yes, but the clean up cost is covered in the price of the ticket.
I'll repeat my earlier point: 1 in 5 jobs in Cornwall are completely dependent on tourism. You seem to be sketching over that as a non-issue. It was ever thus. I was only looking through a 1966 brochure for Newquay th other day - my parents went there on honeymoon, they saved it as a keepsake. All the hotel and B&B prices were in guineas ferchrisakes, and there were hundreds of them. Tourism there probably pre-dates you.
PurpleTurtle said:
People who leave rubbish around will do that wherever they go, they are not just targeting your area.
Your local council makes a pretty penny out of business rates from myriad tourist businesses. If they aren't factoring in the (admittedly annoying) clean up costs of said tourism then they need to get better accountants. It's like people moaning about all the camping equipment left behind at festivals - highly annoying, yes, but the clean up cost is covered in the price of the ticket.
I'll repeat my earlier point: 1 in 5 jobs in Cornwall are completely dependent on tourism. You seem to be sketching over that as a non-issue. It was ever thus. I was only looking through a 1966 brochure for Newquay th other day - my parents went there on honeymoon, they saved it as a keepsake. All the hotel and B&B prices were in guineas ferchrisakes, and there were hundreds of them. Tourism there probably pre-dates you.
Didn't that turn out to be a bit of a bonus at Glasto last year? In that, because it was unexpectedly good weather over the whole weekend, considerably more people than usual actually bothered to take their stuff home with them rather than "dump" it, which meant all the zero-hour staff they brought in weren't needed for a week afterwards, only a day or two?Your local council makes a pretty penny out of business rates from myriad tourist businesses. If they aren't factoring in the (admittedly annoying) clean up costs of said tourism then they need to get better accountants. It's like people moaning about all the camping equipment left behind at festivals - highly annoying, yes, but the clean up cost is covered in the price of the ticket.
I'll repeat my earlier point: 1 in 5 jobs in Cornwall are completely dependent on tourism. You seem to be sketching over that as a non-issue. It was ever thus. I was only looking through a 1966 brochure for Newquay th other day - my parents went there on honeymoon, they saved it as a keepsake. All the hotel and B&B prices were in guineas ferchrisakes, and there were hundreds of them. Tourism there probably pre-dates you.
Shakermaker said:
Didn't that turn out to be a bit of a bonus at Glasto last year? In that, because it was unexpectedly good weather over the whole weekend, considerably more people than usual actually bothered to take their stuff home with them rather than "dump" it, which meant all the zero-hour staff they brought in weren't needed for a week afterwards, only a day or two?
They dump a load of it in Bristol on their way home. I guess they can carry some of their crap on the train, but not the coaches, as they normally leave manky sleeping bags, broken tents and god knows what else at the bus stops by Temple Meads.Spent 5 years living in Bewdley in the Wyre Forest - overrun with Brummies in the summer visiting the Safari Park or the Steam Railway - I now live in beautiful Wiltshire between Avebury and Stonehenge - which can be even worse (Salisbury very popular with Russians apparently)...and I avoid the A303 like the plague during good weather. However, one thing the complainers on here have to bear in mind is that without the tourists in the summer us locals wouldn't have the choice of pubs / restaurants / cafes etc all year round, most of which would fold without tourist £$. So swings and roundabouts. I actually like the buzz the tourists bring in the summer - once lived in a very pretty Cotswold village off the beaten track - no pub, no decent shop (not enough people to support one) - couldn't wait to move. Just grumpy retirees waiting for the grim reaper.
PurpleTurtle said:
People who leave rubbish around will do that wherever they go, they are not just targeting your area.
Your local council makes a pretty penny out of business rates from myriad tourist businesses. If they aren't factoring in the (admittedly annoying) clean up costs of said tourism then they need to get better accountants. It's like people moaning about all the camping equipment left behind at festivals - highly annoying, yes, but the clean up cost is covered in the price of the ticket.
I'll repeat my earlier point: 1 in 5 jobs in Cornwall are completely dependent on tourism. You seem to be sketching over that as a non-issue. It was ever thus. I was only looking through a 1966 brochure for Newquay th other day - my parents went there on honeymoon, they saved it as a keepsake. All the hotel and B&B prices were in guineas ferchrisakes, and there were hundreds of them. Tourism there probably pre-dates you.
I appreciate that a hell of a lot of jobs (always minimum wage) rely on tourism here, I am not sketching over it, you seem to forget that I live, work and spend here, and indeed my wife is one of these unfortunate individuals who works in the Cornish hospitality trade.
But it's a double edge sword.
Some 50% and in some cases uptwards 70% of local homes are second homes or holiday lets.
That 'tourism' takes away homes from the local people who cannot possibly afford to live, let alone buy in the villages they were born and raised in.
I live, work, and spend my earnings in the local economy, unlike a lot of second home owners who turn up here with bags full of Waitrose goods that they have carried with them here.
What exactly are they contributing to the local economy?
They refuse to shop at the local Premier stores or Lidl and spend virtually nothing whilst expecting some poor minimum wage worker to run around after them, tidying up there mess and cleaning their caravan or holiday home.
My wife is a hotel chambermaid, who really does not need to work, but she wants to and enjoys getting out of the house.
But God , she works hard for her paltry minimum wage job.
Tourism is important to Cornwall, not denying it, a lot of people rely on it for their piss poor wage.
Whenever I am out and about in Cornwall, eating, drinking etc,, I always tip as I know what local workers in the hospitality trade have to put up with, and what they earn.
I honestly do not think, that most people who holiday here, appreciate that the staff who serve your food, serve you drinks, clean your filthy hotel room or caravan that you have trashed, work extremely hard under sometimes difficult customers who are often rude and condescending towards the Cornish, all for a poxy, zero hours contract minimum wage.
But , I wouldn't want to live anywhere else in the country, give me a deserted Cornish beach on a beautiful warm late October day and it's all worth it.
Your local council makes a pretty penny out of business rates from myriad tourist businesses. If they aren't factoring in the (admittedly annoying) clean up costs of said tourism then they need to get better accountants. It's like people moaning about all the camping equipment left behind at festivals - highly annoying, yes, but the clean up cost is covered in the price of the ticket.
I'll repeat my earlier point: 1 in 5 jobs in Cornwall are completely dependent on tourism. You seem to be sketching over that as a non-issue. It was ever thus. I was only looking through a 1966 brochure for Newquay th other day - my parents went there on honeymoon, they saved it as a keepsake. All the hotel and B&B prices were in guineas ferchrisakes, and there were hundreds of them. Tourism there probably pre-dates you.
I appreciate that a hell of a lot of jobs (always minimum wage) rely on tourism here, I am not sketching over it, you seem to forget that I live, work and spend here, and indeed my wife is one of these unfortunate individuals who works in the Cornish hospitality trade.
But it's a double edge sword.
Some 50% and in some cases uptwards 70% of local homes are second homes or holiday lets.
That 'tourism' takes away homes from the local people who cannot possibly afford to live, let alone buy in the villages they were born and raised in.
I live, work, and spend my earnings in the local economy, unlike a lot of second home owners who turn up here with bags full of Waitrose goods that they have carried with them here.
What exactly are they contributing to the local economy?
They refuse to shop at the local Premier stores or Lidl and spend virtually nothing whilst expecting some poor minimum wage worker to run around after them, tidying up there mess and cleaning their caravan or holiday home.
My wife is a hotel chambermaid, who really does not need to work, but she wants to and enjoys getting out of the house.
But God , she works hard for her paltry minimum wage job.
Tourism is important to Cornwall, not denying it, a lot of people rely on it for their piss poor wage.
Whenever I am out and about in Cornwall, eating, drinking etc,, I always tip as I know what local workers in the hospitality trade have to put up with, and what they earn.
I honestly do not think, that most people who holiday here, appreciate that the staff who serve your food, serve you drinks, clean your filthy hotel room or caravan that you have trashed, work extremely hard under sometimes difficult customers who are often rude and condescending towards the Cornish, all for a poxy, zero hours contract minimum wage.
But , I wouldn't want to live anywhere else in the country, give me a deserted Cornish beach on a beautiful warm late October day and it's all worth it.
Edited by Mexman on Wednesday 17th April 18:57
Edited by Mexman on Wednesday 17th April 18:59
PurpleTurtle said:
I'll repeat my earlier point: 1 in 5 jobs in Cornwall are completely dependent on tourism. You seem to be sketching over that.
Meanwhile the increased cost of living brought about by the tourists means that even the locals who have better paid, non-tourist industry careers still struggle to afford to live in the area, especially with regards to housing costs.
mike74 said:
And I'll repeat my point that those 20% of jobs in tourism will all be crappy, minimum wage, part time, seasonal jobs of little real value to anyone bar the pocket money they provide for the mostly kids and students doing them.
Meanwhile the increased cost of living brought about by the tourists means that even the locals who have better paid, non-tourist industry careers still struggle to afford to live in the area, especially with regards to housing costs.
It's mostly not kids and students doing these jobs though and you haven't repeated any point.Meanwhile the increased cost of living brought about by the tourists means that even the locals who have better paid, non-tourist industry careers still struggle to afford to live in the area, especially with regards to housing costs.
You have made a new point accepting that these types of job are very poorly paid and workers often have no protection from their employers who are generally from other parts of the world.
My wife is 51 yrs old and works in an upmarket Truro hotel.
The hotel she works for is owned by 2 multi millionaire property investing brothers from the home counties who milk all of the business profits back away from the county.
The only money that stays in Cornwall is the very minimal wages that they pay their overworked staff.
Most young Cornish people have no choice but to live with their parents until the day they die, or move out of the County to live and earn up country elsewhere.
Meanwhile, the population of Cornwall is aging with no young blood to replace it, because they simply cannot afford to live or buy or even rent here.
Tourism is important, but so is quality of life to the residents.
Cornwall is not an amusement park that some people seem to think it is, people live, work and survive here through some brutal winters, come summer, yes the influx of visitors is welcome to certain businesses and their income.
Please do visit, please enjoy your holiday and contribute to the local economy, but also appreciate that the people who live and work here need to get around and work also, and keep the economy moving for the other 51 weeks of the year that you are not here.
Certain places are just no go areas in the summer, you cannot get anywhere near them, St Ives, Newquay, Padstow, Mevagissey, etc.
If I need to get to any of these places in the summer, it's just a nightmare, and the parking charges if you can get one are extortionate.
It really is just a little too much at certain times of the year to even bother venturing out of the house.
True of many a tourist destination I'm sure up and down the country, but I suppose because of Cornwall's 'funnel' shape, everyone just gets forced into a smaller and smaller area!
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