Storm damage severe blow for Coast tourist industry

Press, 8 December 1979, Page 1

Storm damage severe blow for Coast tourist industry

Greymouth reporter

The Coast tourist industry will be seriously disrupted this holiday season, with coach tours unable to travel through the Haast Pass. 4

Tour operators approaching the peak of the season, are already leaving the West Coast off their schedules and are redirecting coaches down the east coast to the Southern Lakes district. This will have a severe effect on areas such as Franz Josef and Fox Glaciers, which depend heavily on the trade from coach tours. Even before the closing of the Haast road. Franz Josef was already suffering from the lack of a complete access road to its glacier. Newmans. Ltd, the biggest operator of coach tours through the area, was ven' concerned about the situation, said its South Island manager (Mr M. Reid) from Nelson yesterday. Told that one operator had already diverted eight coach tours from the West Coast, he said that his company’s numbers would be at least double that. It would be worse by Christmas. During the peak of the season Newmans would usually have up to 10 coaches on the South Island tour circuit on any one day. “We have been to the National Roads Board and the Ministry of Works and Development and have told the Minister of Tourism (Mr Cooper) of the serious effect the loss of the link is going to have on the West Coast,” said Mr Reid. "On top of that we have sold tours in Australia that include the glaciers and now some of them, because of the limited time available. will not be able to “it is very worrying. We have to reroute coach tours down the east coast

and we are trying to get alternative accommodation at a time when most of it is booked out." Mr Reid said that because of the routing of coach tours to Queenstown the company was trying to get accommodation in Ashburton, Timaru, and Oamaru, centres which were not usually geared for major coach traffic. The only Newmans tour which had not been affected was one which went from Nelson to Greymouth to the glaciers and returned to Christchurch through Arthur’s Pass. The pass is expected to be negotiable on December 13. The general manager of Guthreys New Zealand Tours, Ltd (Mr B. J. Doody) said eight tours had already been rescheduled over 10 days leaving the West Coast out. The future of other tours would be reviewed in the next 10 days. “With problems on the Arthur’s Pass, we have an alternative with the Lewis Pass, but there is no alternative with the Haast Pass,” he said. The controller of coach tours for the Mount Cook Group (Mr M. Ward) said his company hoped to take tours to the glaciers and double back through Arthur’s Pass to Queenstown. Mount Cook had about eight tours of its own scheduled but much of its fleet was also hired out to other holiday-tour operators. The operations manager of Trans Tours (N.Z.), Ltd (Mr M. Bourne) said his company would divert up the east coast all tours that usually went up the West Coast. The Ministry of Works and Development says it will be necessary to move the Haast highway on to

the hillside in places because of slips and washouts. But the most serious problem has been the undermining of the Gates of Haast bridge. The bridge is founded on solid rock at the Otago end but the Haast end is on large cylinders which have been sunk into gravel and boulders and which have been almost completely undermined. The bridge is unsafe at present for any traffic. A cabled tower support is planned to hold the end of the truss should the cylinders collapse. Christmas Eve is considered a “most optimistic date” for even light traffic. To have the bridge ready for heavy traffic would involve sinking longer cylinders about 30m deep and this would take time. The manager of Kings Motor Hotel, Greymouth (Mr R. King) said it had lost 100 room bookings in four days this week and up to 1000 bookings could be lost up to Christmas. The Ashley Motor Inn had lost about 100 room bookings this week. The manager of the T.H.C. Franz Josef Hotel (Mr J. Reid) said the hotel was at a standstill. It was already fully staffed for the holiday period. Mr M. A. Kerr, of the Fox Glacier Hotel, said about six staff members had stood down because there was nothing for them to do. The manager of Shantytown (Mr N. F. Thoma's) said the tourist attraction had lost three coach parties through cancellations and could lose many more before Christmas. The Automobile Association (Canterbury) said yesterday that State Highway 80 to Mount Cook had been reopened but could be used only between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m.