Severn Crossing Toll

Written Evidence from Capital Region Tourism

Background

Capital Region Tourism (CRT) is one of four regional tourism partnerships (RTPs) in Wales with, since 2002, resources and responsibilities devolved from Visit Wales for the development and implementation of a tourism strategy for South East Wales. The region includes the following local authority areas: Monmouthshire, Newport, Torfaen, Blaenau Gwent, Caerphilly, Cardiff, Merthyr Tydfil, Rhondda Cynon Taff, Vale of Glamorgan and Bridgend. As a partnership body, CRT’s board of management includes all local authorities in the region together with a corresponding number industry representatives elected by their peers.

The Capital Region accounts for over 30% of Wales’ visitor economy, with a high dependence on short breaks and day visits. Tourism is, per head of population, more important for Wales than any other country of the UK.

The key markets for the region are UK visitors based along the M4 and M5 corridors with 85% using private vehicles and PSVs. The majority of overseas visitors also access Wales through the region from the airports or ferry ports in the South East of England.

It is clear from the above that the Severn Bridges provide a vital link with our key tourism markets. Of course for many more visitors to Mid and West Wales or travelling on to Ireland the region provides the principle transit route.

Comments

In tourism terms we would make the following comments about the current toll regime:

· The tolls are perceived to be the highest in the UK. Those for coaches are particularly painful. This impression is exacerbated by the fact that they are in effect ‘doubled’ by only being collected from westbound traffic.

· We are aware that many of those that have a choice, travelling from the West Midlands for example, will use alternative routes on the westbound journey to avoid tolls, distorting road use elsewhere.

· The level of the toll has greatest impact on those travelling for day visits from the Bristol area for whom it represents a major part of the cost of a visit thus disadvantaging South Wales’ attractions, events and activities in what should be a key local market. In broader terms the tolls militate strongly against the kind of inter-regional connectivity envisaged in the Wales Spatial Plan.

· The impact on longer stay visitors is less cost-related and more to do with (a) the poor first impression of Wales as unwelcoming and grasping (even though Wales receives none of the revenue) often linked to (b) delays and congestion at the toll plaza leading to frustration and anxiety where there are specific deadlines e.g. major events, accommodation bookings.

· For all visitors however there is the lingering psychological impact that it costs money and time to get into Wales but there is no corresponding penalty for entering England. This undermines the Wales brand.

· The bridge operators, sticking rigidly to the terms of the original agreement struck by UK Government, have proved completely inflexible over the years to adopting joint incentive and marketing schemes with the tourism industry which would have proved mutually beneficial, especially for more sustainable forms of transport e.g. coaches.

· Finally, after enormous political pressure, the operators agreed to accept card payments on the bridges in time for Ryder Cup. This followed years of stone-walling and numerous individual cases of humiliation and embarrassment for visitors turned away at the tolls who, like us, could not conceive of any major piece of modern transport infrastructure in the 21st century which had not adopted the universal cashless payment system. It is unfortunate that the system installed for Ryder Cup proved to be only temporary so we are currently back to cash only while further work is done.

· We were very pleased to work with the bridge operators in the lead-up to Ryder Cup on delivering a Warm Welsh Welcome, (Croeso Cynnes Cymreig) and we therefore hope that this heralds a new age of cooperation and collaboration.

· The crossings over and under the Severn represent an important part of Britain’s historical and technological development yet this story is not told anywhere in a coherent way. One way of getting more positive impressions of the crossings would be the development and funding of a visitor centre, perhaps partly from tolls, to celebrate the outstanding engineering achievements and history of the estuary.

· We note that the Scottish Executive scrapped all bridge tolls in Scotland partly because of the perceived impacts on tourism (e.g. Erskine Bridge, Skye Bridge). We appreciate, however, that in the current economic circumstances, the Government is unlikely to be brave enough to give up this useful source of revenue in the foreseeable future especially if control of the crossings remains in Whitehall rather than Cardiff. (As the crossings are however relatively much more important for Wales than England then consideration should be given to the seat of governance…)

Conclusions

In conclusion, and if the tolls are not to be scrapped, we would ask that:

1. Costs are reviewed at the end of the current agreement against other crossings in the UK to test for ‘fairness’ with no automatic inflationary increases

2. A range of effective and efficient payment systems are adopted to minimize stress, optimize travel times and make use of available technologies

3. The bridge operators work constructively with the tourism industry to collaborate on training, joint marketing and incentive schemes to create positive impressions of both the crossings and Wales