Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, June 19, 1994 TAG: 9407150002
SECTION: HORIZON PAGE: F1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Jeff DeBell
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
That's a lot, but less than 3 percent of the estimated $9 billion that was spent in Virginia as a whole.
Gerald Carter, a hotel executive and president of the Roanoke Valley Convention & Visitors Bureau, believes the valley can get a bigger piece of the pie.
He's not alone. Tourism is often put forth as a way the region can strengthen its economy. It's one of the subjects that is being looked at by the New Century Council, which is trying to forge an economic development plan for the Roanoke and New River valleys.
``This area has nowhere near reached its potential for tourism growth,'' said Richard E. Sorensen, dean of the College of Business at Virginia Tech.
``The challenge,'' Carter said, ``is to capture those people who are passing through.''
There are lots of them. More than 16 million per year, according to the bureau, and that's just on Interstate 81 and the Blue Ridge Parkway. Thousands more motor through on U.S. 460, U.S. 220 and other roads.
The main reason more of them don't stop, Carter and other tourism proponents say, is they don't know what the valley offers.
And the reason they don't know is that the valley isn't promoted as extensively as tourism boosters think it should be.
There are a number of problems. One, not surprisingly, is money. The Convention and Visitors Bureau runs on a budget of about $700,000; Carter says it needs at least $1 million.
``Even with that, we wouldn't be as competitive as I'd like to be,'' he said.
The bureau takes pains to point out that it spends far less on tourism and convention marketing than some of the localities it competes with for visitors: $1.1 million in Greensboro.; $2.025 million in Richmond; $2.7 million in Louisville; $2 million in Asheville, N.C.; $4.4 million in Norfolk (including $3 million just for advertising); and $6.8 million in Virginia Beach.
According to the bureau, Roanoke, Salem and Roanoke County collectively realize $10 million in annual revenue from local room, food and admissions taxes.
Carter figures 10 percent of that money ought to be turned over to the bureau for its work, giving it a budget of about $1 million and the localities a tenfold return on their investment.
That's aside from the benefits of the valley's 4,500 tourism-related jobs with an annual payroll of some $57 million.
``We ARE big business,'' Carter said. ``We ARE economic development.''
A number of Virginia localities with new ``hospitality'' taxes are dedicating at least a portion of the revenue to tourism promotion. Danville and Bristol are among them.
But localities where the taxes are already in place are used to the revenue going into their general funds and are loath to let any of it go. Like Roanoke Valley localities, they continue to make separate contributions to the local Convention and Visitors Bureau.
One possible side-effect of dedicating tax revenue to the valley bureau would be to rescue it from its longtime status as a political football. Though Salem and the county have upped contributions recently, $500,000 of the budget still comes from Roanoke, which has been accused of regarding the bureau as its own marketing agency.
One criticism is that the city, having sunk millions into the renovation of Hotel Roanoke and construction of a new conference center there, pushes the bureau to concentrate on convention and conference business at the expense of the leisure travel market.
Most bureaus do emphasize conventions, however. And it's understandable, given the necessity for the publicly funded bureau to be accountable.
``The nice thing about conventions is you can track what you've sold,'' said Martha Mackey, the bureau's executive director. The balance of the bureau's work stands at about 70 percent convention and 30 percent leisure, she said.
Whatever the advisability of the approach, it appears to have begun paying off since the convention sales staff was tripled (to three people) in December. ``Qualified leads'' (i.e., solid prospects) have quadrupled over a year earlier, and the bureau is booking conventions into the next century.
On the books for the year 2000, for example, is a Church of God in Christ convention that is expected to draw an estimated 2,000 people.
Church groups are among the bureau's favorites, Mackey said. Attendees typically drive to the valley rather than fly. Because they have cars, they aren't particularly inconvenienced by being spread among several hotels.
Such dispersal is a fact of life in the valley's convention market. It takes three hotels to build the minimum ``block'' (300 rooms) for a major convention, whereas Mackey says the block ideally should be under one roof.
While this isn't a problem with the Church of God, it can cause other large groups to take their convention business elsewhere. It would be nice, Mackey said, if the valley had the hotel ``product'' to better support the bureau's emphasis on the convention side of the travel market.
The bureau promotes the valley in print and broadcast media in Virginia and other states and as far away as Canada. It sends representatives to appropriate travel conventions, such as those held by bus tour organizers. It maintains the visitor information center on the City Market, and plans to open a mall satellite center as soon as funds permit.
The downtown visitor center is a distribution point for brochures and other information about the area and its attractions. It is open 362 days per year and is staffed by volunteers during the week and paid part-timers on weekends.
In 1993, the bureau says, the center had 39,234 visitors. That's an increase of 22,521 over 1988, the first full year the center was in operation.
The center's activity reflects the fact that it's the only place of its kind. Neither I-81 nor the Blue Ridge Parkway, the two main channels of tourists through the Roanoke Valley, has a visitor center there.
``There is no money for any kind of visitor center,'' said Joyce Waugh of Roanoke County's economic development department.
In addition to construction money - assuming some sort of agreement could be reached with the state Highway Department on where to build - the locality (or localities) would have to come up with operating funds.
Pat McMahon, head of Virginia's Division of Tourism, said it would cost up to $100,000 per year to run a good interstate-highway visitors center. At the moment, there are no plans to build a center.
Meanwhile, every year I-81 carries through the valley an estimated 8.3 million travelers who are on trips of at least 100 miles.
A similar situation exists on the parkway, which passes through the valley on its way between Rockfish Gap (near Waynesboro) and Asheville, N.C. While there are ``visitor contact stations'' along the roadway's 217 Virginia miles, there is none for travelers in the Roanoke Valley.
According to Ranger Glenda Hess at parkway headquarters in Asheville, the Virginia portion of the scenic road had 8,793,726 visitors in 1993.
In a survey of parkway visitors last fall, fewer than one third had any idea of what attractions are in the Roanoke Valley. Moreover, half of them said they weren't headed anywhere in particular.
That indicates they were open to suggestions, said Roanoke County's Waugh, who coordinated the survey. The obvious inference is that at least some parkway prowlers could be induced to explore the valley.
``People are good about that,'' Waugh said. ``But they have to have a clue that it's there.''
If they depend on an official visitor contact station, they won't get that clue anytime soon.
``No proposal is in the works right now,'' parkway spokesman Jim Fox said. Nonetheless, he said, the parkway is ``sensitive'' to the problem.
He said it's a matter of money - there currently isn't any - and of striking a balance among competing needs: the needs of parkway travelers who might like to know what's in the valley; the needs of travelers who don't care and don't want to be bothered by signs and promotional material; the parkway's need to protect its scenic integrity from undue commercial intrusion; and the need of the valley to lure potential tourists in hopes of capturing their time and money.
Near the parkway's southern terminus outside Asheville is a folk art center managed jointly by the parkway and the Asheville-based Southern Highlands Handicraft Guild. The rustic-modern structure was built by the guild but is on parkway property.
It serves as a retail outlet for guild members and an information center for parkway travelers. However, there is little information there about nearby Asheville and that is available only on request.
The Explore Park, which opens to the public on July 2, will have information about the valley for visitors. It is being provided in cooperation with the Convention and Visitors Bureau. There will be Explore signs on the parkway and the park will be accessible from the parkway via a temporary connection with Rutrough Road. A permanent road is to be built later.
In the meantime, parkway travelers approaching the valley can get limited information at Peaks of Otter, Rocky Knob and Mabry Mill. In the valley, those who venture off the parkway onto Mill Mountain will find a kiosk with a local events calendar and directions to the downtown visitor center of the Convention and Visitors Bureau, which maintains the kiosk.
by CNB