Prince Edward County staff pulled back the curtain on the municipality’s Tourism Management Plan at a morning media event Wednesday.
Following summer 2020 that saw a large influx of domestic travel to the county, a tourism management plan was proposed to move forward and to mitigate some of the issues that arose as a result of the high volume and unique challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Director of Community Services, Programs and Initiatives Todd Davis broke down the major pillars of the plan which includes boat launches, Wellington Rotary Beach, parking, garbage and washrooms, visitor services, parking and by-law enforcement at the forefront.
There will now be a $10 entry fee for Wellington Rotary Beach on Saturdays and Sundays pending ratification by council May 25. Residents will be offered a day pass to enter free of charge. Entry to the beach will be restricted once the capacity of 350 people is met, there will be enhancements to garbage and washroom facilities and in order to negate people leaving and returning to the beach, there will be food trucks allowed to operate on the beach as sanctioned by the county.
For boat launches the changes include paying for parking instead of paying to use the launch. Launch users will now pay $20 for vehicles with a trailer and $10 for vehicles without one. Payments can be made through the Mackay pay app or you can display a seasonal parking pass. Non-residents will be able to purchase a season pass for $100. There will also be paddle docks installed at the two busiest launches and finally, as made official at Tuesday’s council meeting, the Belleville Street launch will be closed for 2021.
In order to crack down on illegal parking, the county has contracted a private security firm to enforce parking infractions and by-laws. They will operate seven days a week from May to October. According to Davis there will also be a two hour parking limit enforced in the Wellington core and seasonal no parking zones in problem areas will be expanded.
To address the issues surrounding garbage and washrooms, there will be updated digital and print maps with all 30 public washroom locations in the county which will be cleaned up to three times per day. There will be an increase in the number of garbage bins and a heightened garbage maintenance schedule.
To help visitor services run more smoothly there is now a “plan your trip” section on the county’s website. The campaign is designed to give anyone interested in visiting the county all the information they need in order to facilitate a smooth visit to the county and to avoid conflicts like those seen last summer. There will also be updates to county ambassador training with conflict competence and compassion training being expanded for front line staff.
The summer hub section added to the municipality’s website has a dedicated section for communications for any changes or news regarding anything related to the summer in the county. There will also be regular surveys offered for people to complete in order to accumulate feedback to help identify challenges related to summer tourism.
Director Davis said that while there is no fix-all for the problems facing tourism in Prince Edward County, the new tourism management plan is a good start.
“This is going to be a long term process. We have created a number of elements or tools within the plan this year that we are rolling out in 2021 but we also recognize that we’re not going to snap our fingers and things aren’t going to magically get better this year. It’s going to take a sustained effort over a period of time to help manage visitation to Prince Edward County.”
Mayor Steve Ferguson echoed these comments.
“The plan, I think it’s fair to say, is not going to solve all the issues but I believe that it’s a huge step forward in the right direction in addressing many of the pain points that we experienced last summer.”
There is a resident feedback survey scheduled to launch on May 18 and there is a public information session on the same day at 7 p.m.
For more information see the Have Your Say page regarding the tourism management plan.
