Members of the valley’s tourism industry met last Wednesday for an open forum with a consulting firm tasked with unifying tourism development in Drumheller through a Tourism Master Plan.
“What we want, is a single document that would encompass all the strategies Drumheller needs for tourism,” said Ray Telford, Economic Development Officer for the Town of Drumheller.
“Right now, we have a lot of groups working in tourism– they are doing a great job, but we don’t meet on a regular basis or have a long term plan.”
The plan will analyze the current tourism environment of Drumheller, assess who Drumheller is competing with for the tourism market, design a coordinated approach to tourism development, and identify growth and development clusters for tourism.
The town was provided funds to begin the project in January of this year, and began work on the plan in June.
The first draft of the Tourism Master Plan is expected to be finished by January 2011.
Comments and suggestions gathered at the meeting will be compiled, to be released in a summary in three weeks.
So far, they’ve talked to stakeholders and reviewed information on the Badlands Community Facility. Another open session will be held in February, and the final report should be compiled in the first quarter of next year.
Telford said the town should be expecting a report to increase signage, have recommendations to increase the tourist season to all-year, develop a strategy to expand conference market to utilize conference rooms in the Badlands Community Facility, a summary of the current tourism situation of Drumheller, a five year work plan, annual action plans, identify roles and responsibilities for partners, and to develop a mechanism to monitor the action plan achievements.
Drumheller has never had a single tourism plan, all organizations worked relatively alone on drawing attraction to the valley. This was because such a big project required funding, which was not received until earlier this year, said Telford.
“It’ll be our map to make Drumheller a world class destination,” Telford said.