Victorian Parliament 

Inquiry into heritage tourism and ecotourism in Victoria   Submission Due – 30th August 2013                        Prepared by Peter Abbott Manager Tourism Services Warrnambool City Council       

Submission no. 60 Received 30 August 2013

    

Who We Are

Flagstaff Hill Maritime Village (FHMV) operates over a 10 hectare site overlooking Lady

Bay Warrnambool. At the core of the site are the Victorian Heritage Registered original

1878 Lady Bay Lighthouses and Warrnambool Garrison precinct.

FHMV was established in in 1974 when the Warrnambool City Council and

Warrnambool Chamber Commerce developed the concept of a maritime village based

around the original and derelict lighthouse and garrison areas. FHMV is now a direct

business unit of Warrnambool City Council (WCC), supported by 135 community

volunteers and 13.5 FTE staff.

Since that time we have established Victoria’s largest maritime museum and out

maritime village welcoming over 2.4 million guests to the site.

FHMV is now Australia’s most awarded maritime heritage precinct winning a range of

tourism, heritage, community and event awards.

Land Tenure

The site is currently zoned as Crown Land Recreation and Tourism reserve with an

oversight from Department of Environment and Primary industry. Warrnambool City

Council are the direct operators of the site.

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recent passing of legislation relating to private investment onto national and state

reserves we are unsure if this extends to Crown Land Reserves such as the FHMV site.

Whilst DSE regional managers and well respected across the state we believe their

resources are stretched responding to many land management issues across their vast

portfolio of sites. We have discussed with DSE officers their high priority to fire

management in land management and the seasonal nature of these requirements.

WCC highlights that sites such as FHMV has a high level of heritage protection over the

core heritage zone, plus local heritage planning overlays on other part of the site. WCC

feels that DSE involvement in sites such as FHMV are a low priority across the DSE

land database, and therefore an audit of DSE controlled land be completed to identify

land parcels that could be removed from the DSE land database and handed to other

stakeholders for management. Set criteria should be established to identify benchmarks

for land to be transferred to suitable stakeholders, protection requirements and land use

guidelines.

Transferring land from DSE land

database will provide a more direct

community management model

and free the site from a level of

administrative control.

Recommendation

DSE complete a land

database audit that

prioritises their involvement

in parcels of land;

Set criteria for DSE land to

be available for transfer to

suitable stakeholder management;

Operational Challenges

FHMV is typical of many heritage sites that relies on business operations to finance the

land and heritage values of the site. For FHMV these business operations it involves a

gated precinct with entry fees, on site gift shop, accommodation, night show as well as

functions and events.

Whilst FHMV has won many awards and has very high levels of consumer feedback on

sites such as Tripadvisor the current business model of heritage sites is under extreme

stress with the shift in regional tourism trends, lower regional dispersal by both

domestic and international visitors as well a shift in the heritage tourism market.

The cost to WCC for the FHMV site has doubled in the past 4 years with a rapid decline

in admissions and retail sales.

The generally fixed cost basis of operating heritage sites exposes them to downturns in

visitation and retail spend. The ability to adapt business models to reflect these shifts in

business expectations is restricted by both the very nature of heritage sites and the land

tenure issue restricting the ability to attract private investments to the heritage site.

Heritage attractions through Victoria rely on visitation and user fees to maintain their

attraction as well as the heritage values they protect and interpret.

There are a number of inhibitors to the sustainability of heritage attractions, particularly

in regional areas.

Distorted Heritage Tourism Market

The value that guests are willing to pay for heritage sites is effected by the subsidising

of entry fees for major state based museums and heritage sites. With state museums

offering low entry fees for general admissions underwritten by state government funding

it distorts the costs associated with provided a modern contempory heritage experience.

Whilst this maybe a policy relating to affordable access to the states heritage it distorts

the market for other non-state government supported projects.

Museum Victoria Entry Fees

Adults $10

Children and Concession Holders - Free

http://museumvictoria.com.au/melbournemuseum/visiting/

Parks Victoria Heritage Sites

State government have a recent policy of free entry to Parks Victoria sites. Whilst most

will recognise entry to national and state parks, the addition of heritage attractions to

the free entry policy again effects heritage attractions outside this state government

subsidy as well as effecting consumers willingness to pay entry fees or direct user

charges to sustain heritage attractions.

http://vnpa.org.au/page/publications/nature%27s‐voice‐edition‐4/free‐entry‐to‐victoria%27s‐parks,‐and‐park‐funding‐review  

From Media Release: 

Free entry to Victoria's parks, and park funding review 

Entry to all Victoria's national and metropolitan parks will be free of charge from 1 July this year to encourage people to get active in the great outdoors, the Premier John Brumby has announced. 

National parks that will now have free entry are Wilsons Promontory, Mt Buffalo, Baw Baw (Mt St Gwinear), Mornington Peninsula, Yarra Ranges (Mt Donna Buang) and Pt Nepean, as well as Werribee Park, Coolart, the National Rhododendron Gardens and William Ricketts Sanctuary. 

Other Victorian national parks already have free entry. 

FHMV Day Entry Fees

Adults - $16

Concession - $12.50

Child - $6.50

Whilst state government museums and sites gain direct operating subsidies – some

equating to $38 per visitor attending the site (Museums Victoria Annual Report

2010/11), FHMV receives only (but greatly appreciated) $20,000 per annum for a part

time education officer. This $20,000 equates to just 33 cents per visitor.

http://www.flagstaffhill.com/plan-your-visit/shipwrecked/times-prices/

Scienceworks Star 6 Program

Transport access is a major cost associated for groups to attend heritage attractions.

Whilst metro area heritage sites have access to subsidised public transport, regional

attractions face many challenges in attracting groups to attend the various groups and

education programs delivered at heritage sites.

This issue is further complicated by the Scienceworks Green Star program. The

program provides free travel costs for any Grade 6 school group to attend

Scienceworks education programs allowing easy access to the education programs.

This subsidy for transport costs directly effects other heritage attractions trying to attract

school groups to their site and region.

We have placed requests

to a number of inquiries to

have this program

extended to approved

education programs

across the state and we

wish to highlight this issue

again as a major inhibitor

to a sustainable heritage

and eco-tourism industry.

FHMV have attempted to

overcome this issue by providing our own shuttle bus around Warrnambool providing

school and railway station transfers for fee.

http://museumvictoria.com.au/scienceworks/education/star-6-school-subsidy/

Zoos Victoria – Free for Kids Program

The recently introduced subsidy that allows free entry for children to Zoos Victoria sites

for children on Weekends, Public Holidays and School Holiday again directly effects the

suitability of heritage and eco-tourism operations. These peak periods are vital to

ensure sites can generate the revenues to sustain the operations through the various

seasonal periods.

FHMV has seen a direct impact on the family attendances since the introduction of this

new program for Zoos Victoria and is consistent with other heritage attractions

attendances (Sovereign Hill Annual Report 11/12)

Strategic Partners Program (SPP) Education Programs Funding

This important program allows for heritage sites to develop programs targeting students

and are aligned to the National Curriculum – AUSVELS. This program has a long

history of providing education based programs across a wide range of sites and

regional areas.

The program received reduced funding through the 2010 tri annual program resulting in

many institutions being defunded, or funding considerably reduced. (Flagstaff Hill

funding reduced by 32%).

Continuing to resource these programs supports regional tourism by providing a strong

linkages between tourism businesses and education programs. School camps

programs can be further integrated into the yearly curriculum through the delivery of

SPP approved programs.

We believe SPP approved programs also provide a suitable criteria for exploring the

support of travel subsidy program similar to the Scienceworks Star 6 program. It could

be introduced as a way of intergrating SPP programs with travel support to assist metro

schools to explore regional areas.

http://www.education.vic.gov.au/about/programs/partnerships/pages/spppartners

hips.aspx

Online Presence – Heritage Attractions and Collections

The rise in opportunities that the internet provides for accessing heritage experiences

as well as promoting the richness of Victoria heritage collection and experiences needs

to be maximised.

Many heritage attractions and experiences have skill shortages in developing this online

presence which restricts the full diversity of Victoria heritage experiences being fully

exposed to online traffic. Whilst FHMV is supported by 130 volunteers and has staff

resources, the skills sets required to manage collection and its online presence still

remains challenging.

Museums Australia (Victoria) Collections Victoria

One program that has built a platform for online exposure for heritage collections and

experiences across larger and smaller operators has been the

excellent Victorian Collections program operated by Museums

Australia (Victoria) (MA-VIC). This program has delivered a

platform that allows for smaller and remote groups to raise the

profile of their collections and heritage experiences.

The system has provided an easy to use online collection

management system with training rolled out across the state

by MA-VIC. The system now has over 12,000 items online and

over 140 organisations starting to upload this rich heritage

collection.

As this system develops the opportunity lies in motivating potential visitors to link the

collection items, the collection and the organisation into a key motivator to travel.

Just at the Heritage Victoria mobile app allows visitors to search for heritage

experiences close by using the geographic function of the app. With development the

Collection Victoria website can continue to be the platform for an enhanced exposure of

Victoria’s rich heritage collection as well as being a key link to tourism experiences

across the state.

I urge you to explore the current site noting the broad range of institutions large/small

and geographically spread, and the diverse and important heritage experiences and

collections they expose.

http://victoriancollections.net.au/

Access to Upgrade Works Interpretation Upgrades – Engagement New

Technologies

To ensure heritage sites are delivering contempory tourism experiences for future

guests our sector needs to continually evolve our interpretation methods. Developing

these new interpretation methods requires access to capital or project funding. With

many of our heritage sites operating in a market that is distorted by the factors

mentioned early, gaining access to suitable government renewal funds is an important

element in maximising the impacts of heritage tourism.

We recommend that renewal funding being explored through suitable programs that

has a strong emphasis on identified tourism interest in the heritage site and its links to

the wider tourism economy.

Submission by Flagstaff Hill Maritime Village – Warrnambool City Council August 2013