2019-02-12 Services & Organisation Committee Agenda

SERVICES & ORGANISATION COMMITTEE MEETING AGENDA                                12 FEBRUARY 2019


     years with the growth in online accommodation platforms leading to properties traditionally
     being used for purely residential purposes being used for tourism purposes.
 Council has begun a process to determine the tourism carrying capacity for overnight visitors
   through an analysis of accommodation properties associated with the Tourism Levy and
   crosschecking with the number of bedrooms to determine maximum tourism capacity. That
   process is approximately 80% complete and Tourism Noosa have been also sourcing data
   from their members on bed capacity.
 Statistics on the number of visitors coming to Noosa has been provided to the Sustainable
   Tourism Stakeholder Reference Group. Tourism Noosa obtains quarterly statistics for the
   Noosa Shire from Tourism Research Australia – a commonwealth government agency
   specialising in tourism data. This provides quarterly statistics on visitation, yield etc. The TRA
   statistics from 2017 show approximately 2.3M visitors to Noosa with 52% being from
   intrastate, 35% being from interstate and 17% being international.
 The growth of population in adjoining shires is also a significant statistic with high population
   growth forecast in the Sunshine Coast and Moreton Bay regions bringing more people to
   within driving distance of Noosa (potential day trippers). Moreton Bay is forecast to grow
   from 430,000 in 2016 to 680,000 by 2041. Sunshine Coast is forecast to grow from 303,000
   in 2016 to 518,000 by 2041. This adds an additional 465,000 people to the region to our
   south in the coming years.

3.      THE CONCEPT OF “ACCEPTABLE LIMITS”
One of the members of the Sustainable Tourism Stakeholder Reference Group has particular
expertise in examining localities that are impacted by high levels of visitation. Dr Michael Tarrant
(CCIQ Noosa’s representative) is a professor at a number of universities and has researched this
issue extensively across Australia and internationally.

Not surprisingly, there has been a lot of research in relation to similar issues where localities
become so popular and successful that they attract a large number of visitors. Examples include
Barcelona, Venice, Amsterdam, Lord Howe Island, Milford track, Oxford etc. There has also
been a lot of research undertaken on this issue including a significant piece of research work
undertaken by the World Travel and Tourism Council and McKinsey & Co. This research
identified the worldwide trend and a range of potential options to address them.

https://www.wttc.org/-/media/files/reports/policy-research/coping-with-success---managing-
overcrowding-in-tourism-destinations-2017.pdf

For those communities like Noosa affected by increasing tourism, it becomes a matter of
“managing success” to ensure that the essential nature of why so many people want to visit (i.e.
visitor experience) is not lost. To quote from the Barcelona declaration which examined the
impact of tourism on that local community:

     “What is good for citizens is good for tourism. Places that are good for living in are good for
     visiting. Efforts will focus on improving the quality of life for citizen, managing friction
     between residents and visitors and promoting dialogue and interaction between visitors and
     residents.”

Dr Tarrant has introduced the Sustainable Tourism Stakeholder Reference Group to the concept
of “acceptable limits” which has been successfully used elsewhere to effectively determine the
“carrying capacity” of visitors to a locality. The rationale behind such an approach is as follows:
 Too many visitors can mean that there can be increasing tension between local residents and
    visitors as local lifestyle is impacted.
 Too many visitors can mean that the experience that visitors are seeking may be lost and the
    brand damaged (as an example, Noosa is being marketed as the relaxation capital of

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