The public returns to UK attractions in 2021 when the lockdown is unrestricted
Written byTimes Magazine
Visitor attractions welcome a quarter more visitors by 2021, but the numbers are still below pre-pandemic levels. But even though visitor numbers are up 25% compared to 2020, they are generally 57% lower than in 2019, before the Covid outbreak.
However, these figures do not match, as the attraction was not open for several months in the past year—people strolling through Windsor Great Park with Windsor Castle in the background. Instead, Windsor Great Park has been seen by 5.4 million visitors, while the second most visited attraction was the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, which grew by 61% to 1.9 million.
Other popular attractions include Chester Zoo, Natural History Museum, British Museum, Tate Modern, Somerset House, Science Museum, RHS Garden Wisley, and the British Jeskyns Community Forest in Kent.
The average number of days a location is closed in 2021 if typically open is 99, which is 31% of regular business days. All visitor attractions were closed during the lockdown for the first few months of 2021, but most restrictions were lifted in the summer. Some indoor attractions continued to run with reduced capacity and reduced working hours even behind that.
Sites that mostly outdoors have less steep gradients than indoor sites. This is likely due to restrictions on socializing outdoors at the start of the year. Alva said that zoos are close to returning to pre-pandemic levels, while zoos remain 20% lower.
But there was a much clearer decline for mixed sites like heritage sites and cathedrals, which were down 51 percent, especially indoor spaces like museums and galleries, which were down 73 percent from pre-pandemic levels.
On average, websites that provide international figures report that overseas visitors made only 4% of visits in the past year due to strict travel restrictions. Bernard Donohue, Director of Alva, commented: "These figures show for a unique year that tourism is first and most affected by the impact of Covid.
"There are many of these attractions, mostly outdoor, that are recovering well, but many are still surviving, especially those that are usually heavily reliant on foreign visitors."
He added: "Foreign visitors to the UK are unlikely to return to pre-pandemic levels in 2024/2025. So for many of our most iconic attractions, that means not returning to financial sustainability four or five years after they first closed their doors."
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