Visitor numbers to leading attractions fall by two-thirds due to pandemic pressure

BRITAIN-HEALTH-VIRUS
Tower Bridge
AFP
Robert Dex @RobDexES30 March 2021

The scale of the damage done to the tourist business by the pandemic is revealed today with official figures showing visitor numbers to leading attractions falling by two-thirds on average in 2020.

Among the worst hit were the Royal Museums Greenwich, which consists of Cutty Sark, National Maritime Museum, Queen’s House and the Royal Observatory and saw a 96% decline with only 111,263 visits.

World famous sites including St Paul’s Cathedral, Westminster Abbey, Tower Bridge and Kensington Palace all saw falls in numbers of more than 80%.

The one bright spot was an increase in popularity for outdoor attractions with the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew and the RHS Garden at Wisley both appearing in the top 10 most visited spots.

Londoners forced to stay local and look for outdoor space by the Covid-19 outbreak also boosted the appeal of the Horniman Museum and Gardens in Forest Hill, south London, which leapt 29 places to be the 12th most visited site in the country.

Bernard Donoghue, Director of the Association of Leading Visitor Attractions (ALVA) which compiled the figures, said: “Our annual figures for2020 reflect what a devastatingly hard year the Attractions sector and the wider visitor economy faced. Tourism is the UK’s fifth biggest industry and, as these figures show, was hit first, hit hardest and will take the longest to recover. 

“As we approach Easter, one of the economically important times for our members, we continue to question the Government’s decision to open non-essential retail but not indoor attractions, who will also miss the May Bank Holiday as well.

“In the past 14 months, most of our members have been closed for every Bank Holiday, and therefore we continue to ask the Government to introduce a new Bank Holiday for 2021 at the end of September to thank the NHS and key workers and help the tourism industry repair our balance sheets.”

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