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Saturday, April 20, 2019

Here's how we become a tourist destination



I love to travel. I also love my home. I find it fascinating, when traveling, to realize that in most cases, the places I want to see and the things I want to do are all connected to the local culture. I want to eat what the locals eat, hang out where they do, and enjoy a glimpse of their daily lives. Maybe we should try to do the same in North Grenville. We could become the prime tourism destination for people visiting the Nation’s Capital who really want to see small town Canada.
When my husband the Farmer was the Professor, he took part in a tour of a community in Nova Scotia that had embraced tourism. It seemed like everyone in the community was opening their home and business to visitors in some way. There were bed and breakfast spots that offered great trails for hiking and photography. Some catered to those who wanted to learn how to cook the local cuisine. Others were located on farms, where guests were invited to take part in the daily routine of care for the animals and harvesting vegetables for dinner.
It’s like when you go to Europe and you take a tour of cheese factories, vineyards, cafes, and scenic areas. You want to see and experience the best that the region has to offer. We can do that. We have plenty to offer.
If you operate a local business, be it a hobby farm, an Adirondack chair factory or a maple sugar bush, I would encourage you to explore ways in which you can offer tours, workshops and hands-on experiences for tourists. Then get connected with local travel agents, tourism websites, blogs and accommodations.
As for making our area more hospitable to tourists, there are a few obvious things that we need to consider. We need a large, affordable hotel. I understand that once again, a feasibility study is being conducted to prove that we have the traffic to support this kind of business. It’s not like in bygone eras where every village had a hotel. Now you have to have sustainable traffic flow of something like 50,000 people a year in order to make it cost effective and profitable.
Of course, turning the dorm rooms of the former Kemptville College into a hotel seems like an obvious conclusion. I don’t know what the plans are yet for that building but it seems silly that we can’t take advantage of those existing accommodations – especially during Kemptville Live Music Festival weekend, sports tournaments and other local events. Something tells me that if we were in Europe, our still-useful buildings would already be repurposed. Europeans are very good at recycling real property.
Once we have room for people to sleep, we need them to park somewhere. If the school board manages to find a buyer for our old high school on Prescott Street and it is deemed unfeasible to turn it into condos or a retirement home or something, they might consider a paid parking lot. Goodness knows we need parking downtown. I realize those bump outs were meant to slow down through traffic but they ate up some of our parking spaces. Not ideal.
Finally, I would like to see what the plans are for the Bridge Street bridge. There was a time when we could drive small boats right under it. Now the creekbed needs to be dredged to make room for the engines. But if we are looking at rebuilding the bridge anyway, wouldn’t it make sense to look at other options as well? We once had big steamships coming into the centre of Kemptville on a regular basis. Has the south branch of the Rideau changed so much? Imagine if we could lure boaters in off the Rideau to the centre of Old Town for lunch, or to stay overnight like they do in Merrickville and Manotick.
I think we need to entertain the thoughts of someone who can see the big picture. Dredge the creek, rebuild the bridge in a way that allows boat traffic, expand the existing dock. Businesses will spring up again in downtown Kemptville. We will need a public bathroom facility and an electrical source at the water’s edge. There is plenty of room at Curry Park.
Am I the only one crazy enough to imagine this potential? We could attract daytrippers to our town. We have plenty to offer.

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