Sir, - Apropos the proposed charge for access to the Aran Islands, some international experience in this regard was discussed in April at a workshop held in Kinsale on sustainable tourism and how to achieve it which was organised by UCD, DIT and Kinsale Chamber of Tourism.
The use of such charges is a well recognised mechanism for bringing the use of scarce resources into equilibrium with their capacity to sustain the pressure in question, and to finance needed conservation measures. In the Seychelles, landing fees on islands such as Curieuse ($10 per visitor) which have fragile ecosystems are used both to limit the numbers of users and to finance conservation and management of the resources. Heritage towns are banning non-resident-owned cars from their core areas, and charging for access by minibus, with the revenues used to support both collective transport and conservation. Bru na Boinne has implemented a scheme along these lines.
For such a mechanism to work effectively, five conditions must be met: There should be existing or pending congestion and pressure on cultural life and physical assets; access can be limited at reasonable cost; the charge must be at a level which is sufficiently high to influence the decisions of prospective visitors; some or all of the revenues should be recycled to achieve conservation objectives; in the case of islands, year round residents should be exempted.
In the case of the Aran Islands, the proposed £1 fee is unlikely to influence visitor decisions and therefore visitor numbers and congestion. If a visitor access fee of £5 to £7.50 were imposed in peak season, with exemption for those who can demonstrate that they are staying more than one night, this would generate substantial revenues to meet cultural and environmental objectives, shift the visitor mix in favour of the more valuable long stay, and encourage a shift to off-peak use.
As Frank McDonald's excellent series of articles on tourism demonstrated, we are already at the point where positive and effective action is needed if we are to sustain our cultural and physical endowments. Properly implemented, charges have a valuable role to play in this regard. The Department of Tourism, Sport and Recreation should develop guidelines for their effective use. - Yours, etc.,
Frank J. Convery,
Heritage Trust Professor of Environmental Studies,
UCD,
Clonskeagh,
Dublin 14.