Organised and hosted by the Devon Maritime Forum
‘Coastal Visitor Management’ – 6th May 2021
After a desperate year for the region’s coastal tourism and hospitality sector this spring and summer holds the much welcome promise of a potentially record-breaking bumper season. With searches, inquiries and bookings rocketing, clearly the full opening up of the sector in a few weeks’ time cannot come soon enough for both businesses and visitors alike. Some in the sector began to welcome back customers at the first opportunity on the 12th April, others are frantically making final preparations for the full reopening on the 17th May. But what about our local communities and councils? How prepared are they/we for the record number of visitors that are expected to visit our county and region’s coastal areas this season?
The Devon Maritime Forum’s spring/summer seminar explored the issue of Coastal Visitor Management and discussed how we could support our critically important local coastal tourism economy, whilst respecting local coastal communities, and protecting valuable and fragile coastal and marine habitats.
The webinar followed the familiar format established at last year’s DMF/LNP Summer/Autumn series with three fantastic presentations (from Dr. Jenny Carey-Wood, North Devon Coast AONB; Sally King, Dorset Council/Dorset AONB; and Drs Carolyn Petersen and Tim Wilkinson, University of Exeter) followed by 30 minutes of questions, comments and discussion.
Programme
| Timing | Programme Item | Speaker |
| 11.00 | Welcome and Introduction | Steve Guilbert |
| 11.05 | Coastal Visitors – the Good, the Bad and the Ugly! | Dr. Jenny Carey-Wood |
| 11.20 | Coastal Visitor Management – A Dorset Perspective | Sally King |
| 11.35 | Introducing a decision-support mapping tool for sustainable tourism planning in North Devon UNESCO Biosphere Reserve | Dr. Carolyn Petersen and Dr. Tim Wilkinson |
| 11.50 -12.15 | Facilitated Q+A / Discussion | Steve Guilbert/Attendees |