Transport Policies and Tourism - Essay Example

In the second half of the 20th century, the major focal point of transport policy and transportation studies was on the decrease of the use of mechanical, individual transport, in scrupulous. The key concepts determined on creating a nice-looking public transport supply and to improve the communications for non-motorized traffic in order to open up substitute forms of travel. Although these concepts produced effects on everyday travel, they could not manage with gradually rising problems in the field of vacation traffic. For that reason, mainly supply oriented, high-handed transport policies cannot be seen as a promising loom within the leisure context. Consequently, there are article key factors for successful holiday and tourism public transport provision. There is need for rethinking transport policy by choosing a demand-oriented approach and realizing the importance of additional accompanying efforts in the areas of marketing, transparency and quality. Focusing on the demand side, with its individual attitudes and likings, leads to a new understanding of traffic preparation by adopting a bottom up, instead of a top down approach. Tourist places consist of a range of products and services, which the tourist guzzles, usually at the point of production. Along with these, transport is often ignored, despite the highly important input it makes to the overall tourism product both as a catalyst, providing access to and from the destination, and as a provider of tourist mobility around the desired area. The contribution of good internal convenience to destination quality and pleasure is progressively more being recognized. However, a lack of clarity regarding the division of responsibility between various destination stakeholders often affects the delivery of quality transport for tourism and leisure purposes. Moreover, there is a lack of detailed research on tourists as users of transport networks, with the result that attempts to furnish for this market may be at best poorly knowledgeable, at worst mistaken. At the same time, it is increasingly obvious that visitor destinations are under pressure to cope with large amounts of traffic and overcrowding, in urban areas as well as rural. (Smith, Robinson, 2006) Brighton is a town on the south coast of England and with its neighbor Hove forms the city of Brighton and Hove. The ancient settlement of Brighthelmston dates before the Domesday Book in 1086 but it emerged as a health resort during the 18th Century and in 1841, it became a desired place for day-trippers after the arrival of the railway. Brighton experienced rapid population growth reaching over 160,000 by 1961. Modern Brighton is stretching along the coast, with a population of around 480,000. 8 million tourists every year visit Brighton. The town also has a substantial business conference industry. Brighton has two universities and a medical school. The arrival of the railway in 1841 brought Brighton within the reach of tourists from London and population growth from around 7,000 in 1801 to over 120,000 by 1901. The Victorian era buildings of many major attractions including the Grand Hotel built in 1864, the West Pier in 1866and the Palace Pier in 1899. (Bullen, 2005) The land area of Brighton increased from 1,640acres(7km) in 1854 to 14,347acres(58km) in 1952, after boundary changes between 1873 and 1952. New housing estates were established in the acquired areas including Moulsecoomb, Bevendean, Coldean and Whitehawk. The major expansion of 1928 also incorporated the villages of Patcham, Ovingdean and Rottingdean, and much council housing was built in parts of Woodingdean after the Second World War. Recently, gentrification of much of Brighton has seen a return of the fashionable image which characterised the growth of the Regency period. Recent housing in the North Laine, has been designed in keeping with the area. In 1997 Brighton and Hove were joined to form the unitary authority of Brighton and Hove, which was granted city status by Queen Elizabeth II as part of the millennium celebrations in 2000. The seafront has bars, restaurants, nightclubs and amusement arcades between the piers. Being less than an hour from London by train has made the city a popular destination. Brighton beach has a nudist area i.e. south of the easterly part of Kemptown. Brighton's beach, which is a sand-free shingle beach, has been awarded a blue flag. The Monarch's Way long-distance footpath heads west along the seafront above the beach. (Bullen, 2005) After 1978 demolition of the open-air lido at Black Rock, the area has been developed and now features one of Europe's largest marinas. However, the site of the pool itself remains empty except for a skate park and graffiti wall. In addition, part of the eastern side of the beach has been restructured into a sports complex, which has courts for anything from beach volleyball to ultimate Frisbee, and opened to the public in March 2007. There are several railway stations, bus services, taxis, and coach services. A Rapid Transport System is under construction and in the past it has had trolleybuses, ferries, trams and hydrofoil services. Many trains operate from Brighton Station. Destinations include London Victoria, London Bridge, Gatwick Airport, Portsmouth, Ashford, Kent, Reading, Berkshire and Bedford. Twice-daily services also operate to Birmingham and Manchester, and through Bristol to Wales. Brighton & Hove Bus and Coach Company provide three hundred buses. There is also a limited night service. General apprehension for the environment within tourism practices does not guarantee that the rights and welfare of individual animals would have been considered. In fact, different idealistic positions: environmental ethics, animal welfare and animal rights would each have different repercussions if included into tourism development. There are reports on one case where the deliberate promotion of an animal rights perspective has brought about a structural transformation in tourism provision. Over the past ten years, in the UK, there has been a total shift away from viewing dolphins in confinement to viewing dolphins in the wild. This shift is shown with position to the Morecambe Dolphin Campaign of 1989 to 1991, where animal rights activists brought about the finish of a dolphinarium via combination of direct communication with tourists and through lobbying the licensing local influence. The different ethical issues associated with the UK's new wild dolphin watching infrastructure with particular reference to the Moray Firth, Scotland. So, there is importance of the tourism industry and tourism researchers recognizing the significance of animals as individual performers. (Ostergren, Rice, 2004) There are present one hundred and sixty hotels and guest accommodation establishments in Brighton & Hove with a total of 4,293 leasing bedrooms. This place has a significant stock of hotel and guesthouse accommodation crosswise all standards and sizes. The city's hotel stock comprises mainly three and four star hotels. Brighton is one of the few UK places outside London to have a five star hotel. The city has few renowned budget hotels and no upper-tier budget hotels. The city has a large stock of small, mainly three and four-star guest accommodation establishments, a lot of are using the term hotel in their trading name. The huge majority of hotels and guesthouses are quality guaranteed. The standard of some of the non-assessed properties appears to be relatively low. The largeness of the city's serviced space supply is in Brighton. The supply in Brighton is intense in certain key streets and squares. The seafront and streets and squares running right away off it account for the majority of Brighton's current supply of hotel and guest accommodation. There is relatively little accommodation outside the city centre. Hotels and guesthouses are more widely spread in Hove, with no concentrations of establishments. Six new hotels are presently under construction or proposed for the city. They will extensively add to the city's stock of hotels and serviced space if they all go ahead. If all of these hotels go ahead they would result in a net raise of almost nine hundred hotel rooms, representing a thirty-five percent increase in the city's hotel supply, and a twenty-one percent increase in the total supply of serviced place in the city. (Ostergren, Rice, 2004) There is need to take steps like self-effacing growth in the corporate market. Although the economic forecasts for the town show relatively slow growth in employment, Brighton's role as an equilateral for growth. The extension strategy of key employers in the city will improve the tourism setup. The Council should target sectors that will be productive for hotel stipulate and the planning of new office developments will indicate that growth in corporate demand for hotel and guest accommodation could go above these forecasts. Increasing stipulate, particularly for budget-priced lodging, from contractors resulting from the large number of major development projects underway and proposed. With a historic and cultural merchandise of appeal to overseas markets, Brighton should benefit from the projected increase in inbound visits forecast for the UK. Decrease in collection tour business as demand increases from higher expenditure markets. Projects that are under consideration for their completion in the next twenty years should be completed as soon as possible in order to get results for the tourism industry. These projects are redevelopment of the Brighton Center, Brunswick and Explore Living residential and retail schemes at Brighton Marina, International Arena development at Black Rock, Jubilee Street development including Myhotel, development of new transport facilities and Development of the New England Quarter mixed use scheme including two new hotels, offices, residential and retail. More projects that are needed to be considered include Municipal market development at Circus Street for mixed use, sports center development on the King Alfred Leisure Centre site at Hove along with residential towers designed by internationally renowned architect Gehry, and Shoreham Harbor mixed use regeneration scheme. Brighton's image and profile as a national and international city in which to live, to invest and to visit. From a tourism perspective, and more particularly in terms of the generation of overnight visits, the redevelopment of the Brighton Centre will make the most significant contribution by far to creating additional midweek hotel demand in the future. (Ostergren, Rice, 2004) Present policies for the protection of existing tourist accommodation and the traveling (transport facilities) in Brighton and Hove appear to have worked reasonably well. With the exclusion of one large resort hotel on the edge of the city, and loss of transport facilities by some major hotels, losses of transportation, hotels and guest accommodation have been small. The City Council does not receive large numbers of relevance from bus management for change of use and new public transportation development has happened with supplementary development projected. On the down side, the loss of lodging to transportation use is impacting negatively on the operating environment of other tourism services and guest accommodation, new transportation development is increasingly happening outside the Core Area and site accessibility and value are major obstacles to transport developers securing sites especially in central Brighton. There shows to be strong interest from traveling companies in developing in Brighton but protected sites are the key challenge. Most had to consider mixed-use schemes but often this is not their preferred option. Central Brighton and the seafront were the preferred locations for most operators, but other center of activity like the marina and arterial routes into the city were also target locations. Upcoming policy course in relation to transport should focus on introducing greater elasticity so that policies can be more responsive to existing factors over time. There is need of directing new transport development to the city Centre but not within any defined Core Area, and recognizing the challenges of securing central sites accepting the principle of hotel use at other hubs and generators of demand and along main arterial routes serving these nodes. Pro-actively directing transport improvement to key sites includes employment sites i.e. in the central area, whichever through the site allocation process and Development Briefs, particularly where the Council has site possession. (Bramwell, 2004) Vigorous monitoring is required to put a stop to future certificates of lawfulness being applied for. Policy support to encourage the up grading of existing accommodation, including the addition of facilities such as spas, health clubs and casinos. Active monitoring of demand and supply to enable policy understanding to take account of changing forces on the market will be key to future accomplishment of the new policy structure. Although, the present setup of tourism and various transport services is working very well in Brighton. But organizations will require to be put in place to deliver this. In order to attract more tourists and to gather more currency exchange from Tourism Corporation, there is need to increase various transport facilities like local transport system (buses, cabs), air and rail travels. Bibliography: Smith,M & Robinson,M. 2006, Cultural Tourism in a Changing World: Politics, Participation and (re)presentation, Channel View Publications Bullen,A. 2005, Brighton: More Than a Guide, Jarrold Publishing Ostergren,R & Rice,J. 2004, The Europeans: A Geography of People, Culture, and Environment, Guilford Press Bramwell,B. 2004, Coastal Mass Tourism: Diversification and Sustainable Development in Southern Europe, Channel View Publications, Read More