AW Tourist Congestion Pic Marathon YouTube Video

[Bushcraft]

The day visitors are quite important as well, SANParks are probably making the same margin p/p or close to on a day visitor to an overnight visitor if you take the infrastructure costs, staff required (shops, petrol, laundry,restaurants,cleaning, managers as well as HO, booking staff, website), maintenance, insurances etc etc. The wild card gets paid in advance and earns an interest and some people only just cover the cost of the card. Day visitors also spend money in restaurants, shops so they help cover costs of these places.

Don’t say that RT, imagine how many could lose their jobs

Seriously though, I would love to know the exact figures, but if one can trust RP’s maths the answer is there

1916250 over 365 days...take 20 %...conservatively, gives Around 400 000 tourists over and above overnighters...
So day visitors can make up over a quarter of those in the Park if we take Kruger's 1 400 000 bed nights confirmed for 2013?

If the days visitors accounted for 25% of the number of people, then they would add max 25% to the revenue if their earning potential equates to an overnight visitors as you state, which I have my doubts about; they still then also add 25% to the traffic volume, so if their numbers were cut in half and the price was doubled, then SANParks still makes the same money, but improve the traffic volume by 12.5%. (They also increase the financial benefit of staying in KNP, so could operate at higher occupancy)

They certainly can’t decrease the numbers booking camps; imagine the outcry and the jobs that would be lost, so if I had to answer for jobs, turnover and congestion, I would take the obvious choice.

The first problem is, nobody is holding SANParks accountable for this congestion, hence the importance of this vid from Brat

The second problem is that SANParks aren't acknowledging there's a problem, which makes the distribution of this vid important

[Richprins]

Hey! I'm not a maths teacher...just using a calculator!



Don't really understand this bit about day visitors contributing fanancially vs overnighters...

[RobertT]

Sorry BC, haven't explained what I was trying to get across properly in terms of day visitors vs night. I believe the day visitors are more profitable to SANParks than the overnight visitors by %. Day visitors use a little infrastructure, costs of which are shared with overnighters, so a bigger % of their say R50 goes to SANParks, where an overnighter may pay R1000, but the infrastructure to accommodate them eats a higher % of there R1000 and costs SANParks more. So the more day visitors SANParks can squeeze in, the better they are feeling, their best is probably the OSV trade from the places at the gate and just outside, as there are generally more people per vehicle, most wont have wild cards and are overseas tourists paying a premium and using little of infrastructure.

If they halve the day visitors and double the price, the wild card would double and affect overnight guest as well, instead of taking 4-5 days of overnight to cover cost of card, it would be 8-9 days. The more you use the card, obviously the cheaper it gets but some people only manage 1 trip per year and maybe not even a week.

Think the wild card should have a limit to amount of times it can be used in a year, say 10 times a year, over that the person should pay conservation fees. Not saying 10 days, but 10 times during a year. So the locals who go regular also up their spend like us who have to overnight, maybe they will stop going and free up some traffic or perhaps no wild cards may be used in busy periods unless you are an overnight guest.

But I agree, the South has too much traffic.

[Bushcraft]

I do believe the infrastructure; etc costs are shared in many aspects (road, petrol, shops, restaurants, etc) and would be needed irrespectively. There hasn’t been major capital outlay in camp infrastructure for years, hence the continued complaints about the accommodation maintenance and if one looks at the fact that accommodation costs have doubled in the last 5 years for less than an equivalent spend, I doubt the margins are very small for overnight visitors.

I agree with the OSV trade from the gate and I understand your point about the wild card and agree with your limit idea

The general feeling though is that there’s massive congestion, especially in the south and the best plan would probably have something to do with limiting day visitor numbers, which would also have a return benefit in that it will attract more to stay in the park.

On a personal note, if I get to visit Kruger twice a year and pay the big bucks for the accommodation in the park, spend more than day visitors in the park, because I don’t want to leave the park each time I want to stock up, then I don’t think it’s fair for me to have to put up with the chaos hundreds of day visitors cause

[leachy]

if I get to visit Kruger twice a year and pay the big bucks for the accommodation in the park, spend more than day visitors in the park, because I don’t want to leave the park each time I want to stock up, then I don’t think it’s fair for me to have to put up with the chaos hundreds of day visitors cause

my feelings exactly...

[RobertT]

I do believe the infrastructure; etc costs are shared in many aspects (road, petrol, shops, restaurants, etc) and would be needed irrespectively. There hasn’t been major capital outlay in camp infrastructure for years, hence the continued complaints about the accommodation maintenance and if one looks at the fact that accommodation costs have doubled in the last 5 years for less than an equivalent spend, I doubt the margins are very small for overnight visitors.

If you took the day visitors input out of the equation or even halved it, the infrastructure would then have to all be carried by overnighters, it is not like if you took day visitors away, you could do away with some of the infrastructure, it would still be required for overnighters. So really every cent that the day visitors bring in subsidises the overnight visitors as they are using existing infrastructure that needs to be there anyhow for the overnighters. If you took this monies out of SANParks, there would be even less monies for the maintenance of infrastructure etc and the only way to recoup this would be to increase overnight prices. Not something I want as I have already had to cut down trips. Think SANParks have already got used to and budgeted these monies, could you take a 12.5% or 25% whatever the percentage is decrease in your salary and still do the things you need to do?

On a personal note, if I get to visit Kruger twice a year and pay the big bucks for the accommodation in the park, spend more than day visitors in the park, because I don’t want to leave the park each time I want to stock up, then I don’t think it’s fair for me to have to put up with the chaos hundreds of day visitors cause

I agree here, , I always have to overnight so am also affected by it. Think Toti beaches should also just be for overnight guests.

[Bushcraft]

Think Toti beaches should also just be for overnight guests.

Unfortunately they aren’t for people who live in Toti or for previous JHB visitors. Now you visit at your own risk I drive 35km down the coast for safety

[Bushcraft]

If you took the day visitors input out of the equation or even halved it, the infrastructure would then have to all be carried by overnighters, it is not like if you took day visitors away, you could do away with some of the infrastructure, it would still be required for overnighters. So really every cent that the day visitors bring in subsidises the overnight visitors as they are using existing infrastructure that needs to be there anyhow for the overnighters. If you took this monies out of SANParks, there would be even less monies for the maintenance of infrastructure etc and the only way to recoup this would be to increase overnight prices. Not something I want as I have already had to cut down trips. Think SANParks have already got used to and budgeted these monies, could you take a 12.5% or 25% whatever the percentage is decrease in your salary and still do the things you need to do?

I couldn’t take the financial knock, but the point is SANParks wouldn’t if they doubled the price for day visitors. (Agreed with the wild card story though, but limit as you say ) There’s also a counter argument that overnight visitors share a large portion of the infrastructure which day visitors would need.

Anyway, I think we are on a similar page

[Richprins]

Don't many Saffies use Wild Card to avoid conservation fees while overnighting? Remember, if you exist in a Park you must pay daily, end of story!?

[Flutterby]

Maybe conservation fees should be separated from entrance fees....overnight & day visitors pay conservation fees but day visitors should perhaps pay an entrance fee as well?