Re: Tourism Promotion (E.80,000 to be invested in marketing Cork tourism, postering and PR literature)

Lord Mayor, this is a very welcome addition of funding.

I would like to ask where does Cork Marketing Partnership, the Cork Festival Forum fit into this campaign.

I know from recent meetings I had with people in the tourism market in Cork that Bravo communications hold the grasp on any advertising in our Railway Station and Bus Station. Those rights need to be negociated so that we can move forward with putting up posters and literature. The Cork 2005 posters in the Bus Station should be taken down and replaced. Both the bus station and rail station are devoid of literature – and as for the airport we also undersell ourselves and the festival work that goes on in the city.

You get off a plane in Cork and the first site that was presented to you recently was go visit the Giant’s Causeway in Antrim. That would be fair enough if you thought in somewhere like Belfast that a similar sign said, come to Cork City but I was recently in Belfast airport and you’re met with a mini tourist office pushing Belfast as a cultural destination and also telling what events are coming up in months to come enticing the visitor back.

Cork has a product, which is better than Belfast. We have a lonely planet accolade but again no directional signs exist to show tourists who get off the Cork Swansea Ferry, where Cork is. I have seen the Ferry’s tourist literature and I wish to complement all those involved in it.

I’m also worried at the Discover Ireland campaign which pitches Galway as the festival capital and we have 100 festive days in Cork – that is worth talking about – in addition within the brochure, only two Cork City hotels took an ad out within in. Which means that a large part of the two pages with the magazine dedicated Cork-Kerry region was dedicated to activities in Kerry.

I’m still concerned at the clamping signs that were to be revisited last summer and replaced with friendlier signs. I see from figures released publicly by the roads department that the influx of traffic into the our multi-storey carpark is down 3.6 % -that equates to the bones of a loss of income to Cork City Council from 1,000 cars and loss of income to the city centre.

We have an amazing city to offer – as part of my own work last Friday, I had to show 30 national tour guides around the city centre. I had to stop at St Patrick’s Quay and was presented with a barely readable sign welcome to Cork City. My audience commented that we have a fantastic walking city and that is an aspect that should be developed but because they noted we undersell ourselves, tourists are brought to place who fight more for tourist share.

So I want to know where is the strategy? Where is the plan? I wish to propose a call for a swot analysis on the tourist potential for Cork City by all those that we as a City Council fund.