P.E.I. tourism sees growth in July

Poor weather in July does not appear to have had a significant impact on P.E.I. tourism.

Tourism numbers released by the province Thursday show the Island is tracking ahead of what was a record year in 2014, when the province promoted heavily the celebration of the 150th anniversary of the Charlottetown Conference.

"It has a lot to do with last year I think. And it also has to do with the dollar value. A lot more people are staying home in Canada," said Tourism Minister Heath MacDonald.

"But we also, you know, we've been really aggressive. We did additional radio buys regionally through New Brunswick and Nova Scotia. We have media fam tours. We had them here from Australia, Germany, U.S. and Japan. I think TV programs like etalk that we were highlighted on, and Fins and Skins and the Marilyn Dennis Show, I mean definitely they have a broad audience and hopefully that is having a major effect on our numbers."

The strongest numbers were at some of the Island's entry points, indicating more people visiting the Island. Traffic at the Confederation Bridge and Northumberland Ferries were both up double digits. Motor coach traffic was up the most, at 36.7 per cent.

Cruise ship and air traffic were down.

Overnight stays were up, but not as much as the increased traffic at entry points would suggest, indicating perhaps people were not staying as long as they did last July.

Hotels, motels see boost

Overnight stays were up 2.0 per cent in July.

Fixed roof accommodations benefited in particular from the increased traffic. That's in contrast to last year, when camping drove increased business.

Total room nights sold in July were up 2.6 per cent, with camp sites sold up 1.2 per cent.

The benefits of increased visitation were fairly evenly spread across the province, with the west seeing the biggest increases.

Visitation from other Canadian provinces was relatively flat, while the number of American visitors was down. Most of the increased tourism business appears to have come from other countries, where there was a 37.3 per cent increase.