Tourists, where art thou? Nova Scotia wants to know

[WilleyB]

http://www.herald.ns.ca/Front/525799.html
N.S. industry hurting after 12% drop in summer visitors
By CLARE MELLOR Business Reporter

automobile visitors were down 12 per cent, motorcoach visitors dropped 38 per cent, RV visits were down 24 per cent and air visitors were down one per cent. It seems the hotels are doing about normal (air travel) but lodging along the tourist routes are not
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">said Ms. Ballard,]"In our location, we get a lot of tourists but people seem to be staying at cheaper accommodations, like at friends and family." </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
I guess they'll have to amend the Nova Scotia Tourism and Accommodation Act so it will be illegal to stay with one's family or friends while visiting Nova Scotia and that should cure that form of Indiscriminate camping along with the RV problem

38% and they still don't get it. Yes to some extent gas/fuel and the $ differential has some effect but after paying anywhere from $50,000 up for a used MH up. to a quarter million or more for the classy A's who's going to leave it sitting in the driveway for the summer.

[WilleyB]

http://www.herald.ns.ca/Front/525799.html
N.S. industry hurting after 12% drop in summer visitors
By CLARE MELLOR Business Reporter

automobile visitors were down 12 per cent, motorcoach visitors dropped 38 per cent, RV visits were down 24 per cent and air visitors were down one per cent. It seems the hotels are doing about normal (air travel) but lodging along the tourist routes are not

Quote:

said Ms. Ballard,]"In our location, we get a lot of tourists but people seem to be staying at cheaper accommodations, like at friends and family."

I guess they'll have to amend the Nova Scotia Tourism and Accommodation Act so it will be illegal to stay with one's family or friends while visiting Nova Scotia and that should cure that form of Indiscriminate camping along with the RV problem

38% and they still don't get it. Yes to some extent gas/fuel and the $ differential has some effect but after paying anywhere from $50,000 up for a used MH up. to a quarter million or more for the classy A's who's going to leave it sitting in the driveway for the summer.

[brad03ca]

A good article Willy, and I agree with you.

[Little Kopit]

Copying many Newfoundlanders and Labradorians maybe and using the TT or the 5er as a seasonal home down at the lake.

[Lorna]

We need to e-mail the newspaper and tell them WHY RV tourism is down. Here's CLARE MELLOR Business Reporter (the writer) addy cmellor@herald.ca


I have already sent an e-mail and included the link to the Andrew Cornwall Study

[The Shadow]

Do people REALLY believe that not being able to park in a Walmart lot overnight has caused the reduction in RV traffic?

Very naive IMO.

[Little Kopit]

Well, there are those that think that rvers will boycott an entire province over this issue. God knows why.

Not being able to plan your trip you have to stay inside a city when in 20 minutes you could have been staying where you could be surrounded by the out of doors, is to me pure ???? But there are those who get really wicked with their condemnations over the very idea of being limited in any kind of freedom.

Frankly, I buy into the theory of gas prices and the higher Canadian $ as being the causes of the decline, as does the Chronical Herald article.

There are those who will buy food and everything else as economically as they think they can rather than experience an area. That too makes me wonder why they bother to travel.

[WilleyB]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">should cure that form of Indiscriminate camping along with the RV problem </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
Nope! I didn't, nor did the article mention Wal-Mart or down by the lake either campground owners will tell you down by the lake is illegal also.
But let's face it we know that is what we are programmed to believe about NS and I believe prospective tourists do get wind of it and become indecisive about coming here, then go elsewhere where everything is above board and easy to understand. I may stand corrected with this but the addition of the Overnighting clause to the Tourism and Accommodation Act in 2003 saw declining numbers of RV's to the province, I believe it amounts to between 2000 and 2500 decline each successive year. Note that up to this year the $$ exchange for US$ and the price of fuel and gas was quite acceptable to our visitors from the South. A portion of this years decrease can be attributed to the strong Cd.$ and the cost of fuel the rest is a result of the normal Anti RV decline.
Now is NS anti RV? Well not really, most of us along with the big box stores are as confused as our prospective tourists. We'll take our shopping centres for example. They are posted with the "No Overnight Parking" signs, but if I went there late tonight there would be RV's overnighting there without anyone bothering them. You might ask why they are not cited for breaking the law. This is where the confusion comes into it.
The NS Tourism And Accommodation Act is a set of laws to regulate all accommodations and campgrounds. It does Not regulate RV's they are under the motor vehicle act. So no matter where an RV parks there's no law broken Unless is a regulatory sign. Privately erected signs in parking lots are not regulatory unless passed by a town or Provincial law. Ie: I could put a sign up on my property and the only way the police would act on it is if I made a complaint. Still there would be no law broken unless you refused to move on when the police asked.
Within walking distance of my home off the TCH 104 there is a new rest area, touted to be NS's first. There are none of the no overnighting signs, there are most likely RV's in there now. There is a small Tourist bureau there also. If you ask them about RV's and camping, well you'll get the TIANS and COANS load of crap that you have to park in a campground.
Hi Lorna thanks for your input. I also have tried writing to the authors of similar articles in the Hfx. Herald. I hope you have better luck, they didn't answer me but again this is a different author.
Li'll K. we have many secluded lakes and beaches in this province, you're welcome to try some of them, however a lone RV would attract a visit from the police with a few polite questions as to why you were there and if all was ok, then they wouldn't bother you anymore, but would keep an eye on you to make sure you were ok. (Everywhere here in NS is only a couple of gunshots from somewhere else in NS) so police coverage is pretty good.
Cheers Willis

[Lorna]

I keep a database going on my computer listing the places that have parking bans. My money, my choice. We park overnight in parking lots. While I would love to see Nova Scotia, I am quite aware that there are other provinces that don't mind overnight parking. I watched CBC via C-Band satellite for years until the signal when digital (and in the middle of the season of DaVinci's Inquest!! ). It helped us to see that Canada is huge and quite varied. So much to see.

[Little Kopit]

A different insight comes from down south!!!


You know we're all sort of copying children's behaviour on this topic. When their parents disagree, children have a tendency to blame themselves, or so we're told.

To support that I heard an interesting interview on CBCs Labour Day NL Info Morning today. Our St. John's host, whose turn it was to do Labour Day, made contact with the head of a tourist organization in the States. That interview offered new insight to why U.S. citizens like to tour Canada and why they're not coming this year. We shall see, if I remembered corectly.


Why fewer U.S. tourists in the order I think she, the interviewee, mentioned them:

1) Passport insecurity. We know passports or some other form of identification are going to be required for air travel in 4 months and land travel in 16 months. We don't know what the alternative will be and many are not sure of the date.

2) Border delays. People have the impression that border searches are taking longer.

3) General fuel costs have more people staying closer to home.

4) Exchange rate. With our healthier economy, U.S. residents US$ don't go as far as they did last year and the year before.

5) If people have to go through increased security checks, why put off travel to other continents. She said that U.S. citizens had been hesitating to go abroad since 2001 and now the numbers going that way are picking up.

------

Why U.S. residents like visiting Canada:

1) The people are friendly. Take a bow all, we all contributed to that

2) A lot of things in Canada are rather familiar. (more familiar in Canada than in the U.K or NZ or Oz, for example).

3) They will have been to another country.

To be sure, she was bound to be positive in doing an interview on a Canadian radio station, but still I think she's right. We are in an international market, and while that has been depressed because of September 11, the world has made some adjustments. Those who want to travel can now travel overseas with greater assurance of what to expect. & I don't mind having been chosen when the rest of the world was avoided.

Perk up all, it isn't the NS. government, the dratted ferry rate to NL or the high mountains of BC or parlais en francais dans le Quebec. Mais non, c'est tout le monde.

[WilleyB]

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">You know we're all sort of copying children's behaviour on this topic. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>
Sorry Li'll K can't agree there. Basically what I'm seeing are true reasons why tourism has dropped off. The reasons are quite varied

(1) Perceived negative attitude and Reception toward visiting RV users as expressed by Lorna. The same might be true of others (not only RV'ers) doing a Google search about NS and coming across messages of a negative content.
(2) Unfortunately using the experts diagnosis of a situation rarely takes in all affecting factors to the problem. My situation in particular for example. The $ exchange, cost of gas, border delays etc. has no bearing on why I'm not on the road. My problem is lack of funds because of property repairs. Next year if gas is over $2 a litre I'll still head for points West. (But that's just me) The experts rarely consider these types of factors, and a whole lot of little negligible factors can make a big one.
(3) The push to by the tourism industry bring the NS Tourism act under the criminal code is causing a lot of negativism and indecision to the industry.
In regard to this part of my post <BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content"> I guess they'll have to amend the Nova Scotia Tourism and Accommodation Act so it will be illegal to stay with one's family or friends while visiting Nova Scotia and that should cure that form of Indiscriminate camping along with the RV problem </div></BLOCKQUOTE> it is tongue in cheek as in the past two months (or less) they were lobbying the government to make new laws to prevent cottage owners from renting their summer cottages out for a few weeks when not in use.
As for 1 to 5, yes we've all seen proof of these on the forums. Bad experiences by one person can be multiplied many times when first told and then repeated by many others with their own additions. So what I'm saying here, is that something that could be viewed as a having a minor or negligible effect, could in fact have a major effect on the outcome of a situation. Due to the ferries and the toll road on the TCH, NS with cooperation by the operating authority has a way to monitor visiting traffic. I'm told NS RV's are not counted in the stats so it is quite accurate.
OH! well time to move on
Cheers Willis

[Little Kopit]

Foregive me WilleyB, until this thread, I had never seen you who would willingly add to the negativism over that issue. I don't understand why you are doing so.

To me the tack should be come on Nova Scotia, show you want rvs, set up rest stops on 10 to 100 x as many roads as you have them on now. Help municipalities do the same. Quebec is doing it and being very successful with this positive strategy.

Second thing, I thought I said that was was this representative of the U.S. tourism organization said were the perceived reasons why U.S. tourists weren't coming to Canada It's not minor. There are 100 times as many U.S. citizens as there are Canadian residentts!!!!

Yes, I do think you're blaming Nova Scotians when major factors are the rest of the world.

Get with it please, try and get Nova Scotia to start welcoming tourists.

There may be more positive ways to say, we want you. I've suggested two. Positive is sugar, negative is sour. Encourage rather than discourage!!!

[The Big Kid]

I apologize in advance for the longwinded post, but I was planning on sending this in anyway.

I read the article mentioned... while sitting on the picnic table outside my RV in "The Plantation" campground saturday morning (they provided papers free every morning - I get up and it was under my awning). As my weekend went on, I mulled over the many permutations of these thoughts, the reasons why and what could be said about it. I decided that I would send my 2 cents into the author of the article. Before I got to that, I found this thread.

But, I recently moved to NS this summer, I traveled 7500 kms from coast to coast to get here, I stayed at numerous campgrounds, parks and resorts. Since arriving here, I have gone out 3 times with my family and trailer, to different parks approximately 1 -2 hour drives from the outskirts of Halifax. I have made some epiphany like observations that may have some bearing on the problem.

The roads - as I was driving along highway 101 between New Minas and Coldbrook, I noticed that there were 6 other RV units in the line of traffic ahead of me, none visible in the mirrors behind me. But, as far forward, and as far behind as I could see, was bumper-to-bumper traffic- ALWAYS. Passing lanes are few and far between on this road and if you try to run the speed limit with a trailer, you will find nothing where you left it when you get to where you are going. All bridges and overpasses shake your unit like nothing you have seen before, patches on top of patches, YOU MUST SLOW DOWN, and this bogs down the traffic.

Fuel - As I have traveled, I inevitably talk to various people from a variety of places, and overall, most people DO NOT change plans based on the fuel prices, but, if they think they are getting screwed, they avoid places/chains. I have been given several recommendations by locals, no matter where I am, about - go here, don't go there etc. I have watched in the month and a bit since I arrived that the "watchdog" has lowered gas prices twice, outside of the normal 2 weeks, but diesel remains the same. I would love to here the answer to that one. Internet watchers of various price sites can monitor the fact that the price for gas can go down, but diesel doesn't, so that becomes one of the reasons people choose to avoid a general area - by province. But, overall, probably not a big factor.

Internet - with such a powerful tool at our fingertips, tourism agencies need to adapt to this feature, and make it work to you advantage. I found it quite difficult to find information on places to go, things to do etc. I started with my CAA campbook, but it does not cover all campgrounds. Most search engines can leave out many campgrounds because the wrong search word is used. In today's world, many travelers plan trips well in advance, and with the many tools available, can plan their days mileage, places to stay, and the things to do. If they can't find the information they need, they believe it's not available, so plan elsewhere.

The draw - by this I mean, what is it for people to see and do. For Nova Scotia, it needs to be better than the next guy, why, because when you go somewhere in this province, you most likely have to backtrack on the same road to leave, and you have to travel a significant distance out of your way to get there, so Nova Scotia MUST sell itself as the destination of your travels, because very few travelers will go through here on a side trip, when they are going somewhere else. I could sit a debate the various options about being able to go around the southern end of NS via the 101, and 103, but if you are travel planning to do this trip, there might not be much for you to do, to account for the amount of time you will need to spend doing it. Halifax itself is excellent, and would make itself a great hub to base yourself from, but - without parking at Wal-Mart, you can't - this segways nicely to my next point.

Accessibility to places - Halifax has 3 campgrounds, count'em - 3, within easy access to town, and the "easy access" could be debated. So, without being able to stay in a parking lot, you can't bring your RV to Halifax. So, if you can't they won't. Even in small towns, they are not easily accessible to larger units, example - Labour Day weekend in Berwick, I take the dually to town so the kids can watch the parade. I find a place to park, put the front wheels rubbing against the curb, outside right dual ON THE CURB, and my left side and tires are across the white line for parking. The wife wanted to go back through after we left the park with the trailer to check out a shop, I said NO WAY, I wasn't going to try and take this unit into a small town, KNOWING I COULDN'T PARK.

Campgrounds/RV parks - One of the biggest thought bubbles this weekend was how the "style" of the RV parks here are different than most I have seen. Most of the parks cater heavily to "seasonal" trailers - the people that leave their trailer there all the time and come up and treat it as their cottage. 2 of the parks I have been to have greater than 50% of their sites for "seasonal", the campgrounds set up nice events and such, but the events get overrun by the group of people that all know each other. In some cases, I believe that the management lets them run with it by letting everyone wander the grounds with open alcohol, blatantly disregarding the posted rules, such as not letting kids ride bikes after dark, wearing helmets etc. But, when quiet time is 1 am to 7 am, and you have kids in bed and the beer bash dance at the rec hall lets out, and everyone walks back to their trailers, kids wake up, dogs bark at the noise and those of us trying to sleep, might not do so well. Just so everyone knows, I actually liked the campground, just surprised by some policies/decisions; I will go back there. But, if you were a tourist, and had your sleep ruined nightly by the locals, YOU WON'T GO BACK. These trailer parks are very different from what most of the RV'ing world is used to, some can roll with it, and others won't.

So, when you travel, how are your decisions of where to go/what to do influenced by? Most RV'ers, as far as I know, will probably heed the advice of someone who has made the mistake before. I can just see the campfire conversation of the family from Indiana that wanted to go to Upper Clements park, after driving up to Truro to Windsor via the "secondary highway" - cuz on Mapquest.com it looked shorter, then on to the 101 towards Digby, into Annapolis Royal to find a campground that is still a short drive away (the park doesn't have its own), to have to drive back the same way again because the ferry was waaaayyyy to much $$, telling their neighbours that it was a fun park, but a nightmare to get to with our trailer.

So, until we as a province (I live here now too), can produce 10 pleased visitors for every 1 that didn't like our roads/fuel/campsites etc, numbers will drop off, why, because people have been here, and are telling others it wasn't as good as they hoped it was.

RV'ers are a fairly close knit group, we trust each other with our travel plans, I always ask people where they have been and what they recommend, I have found some awesome destinations, or places to stop that way, and if someone else liked it, most other RVers will too.

My 2 cents, I am willing to discuss and debate anytime.

[Little Kopit]

Ok, I shall start with the end first.

Which is adapt!!!!!!!!!!!

Any place that was settled by 1815 has got side roads, roads that are very charming if your eyes are open. If they are not, then you will say there is nothing there.

I don't do rv parks. Anything that is open concept is something I try to stay away from. I have 2/3 of an acre of land right now. I don't want to be more squeezed on holidays more than I have to be. 30' wide is basic. The dogs have 10' of chain clear. That way your rig doesn't over hang their chains.

In an open field I have had people walk within chain length of my dogs and then complain that they barked. HUH! We rented that space. So, I don't think I'd stay at the place you're talking about. & if I saw quiet time any later than 11 pm, I wouldn't stay, you can bet your bottom boots I wouldn't. I don't even like 11 pm to start quiet time.

And planning, over planning you mean. Sorry, everyone whom I have heard of planning to the nth degree winds up making changes. I start with goals. I never achieve them all. There are always ones saved for the next time.

So, discover the charm of side roads, places with a 500 year history!!!. Don't arrive and say to the locals: "you have to change to be like the rest of the continent." Hit the museums, start to learn where you are. & just maybe, try out the provincial campgrounds. Most where I have been in Nova Scotia have nice trails to explore.

One thing I consistently say about places with long term European settlement, if you haven't driven the side roads and really looked, you haven't visited an area, at all.

Maybe I sound harsh, but I'm afraid I hear too much of this place has to modernize. You will be unhappy if that is how you see a truely lovely place.

Lastly, I will mention a place I enjoyed about 10 years ago. It's a campground near Five Islands. I think it's an Provincial Park, but it has some places open enough for you.

Smaller populations, less dense populations have fewer $ to work with. I have lived in Nova Scotia.