Tourism Nanaimo says the visitor’s centre at Northfield Road was closed last month to bring more traffic into the city and have more visitors come downtown to enjoy what the city has to offer.
The centre was originally established in 2015 and, according to Nanaimo Tourism, it has seen a variety of purposes. Executive director Carly Pereboom says while they were thrilled people were visiting the facility, it wasn’t serving the area justice.
“We found our numbers were substantially lower in other areas on the island and for other centres,” she says. “Also, the location was not driving traffic into the city. It was acting more like a regional visitors’ centre.”
Pereboom says they will be moving the facility downtown into the Vancouver Island Conference Centre because of the central location and the potential tourist benefits it brings to the downtown core.
“Our primary objective is to drive traffic into Nanaimo to support our businesses,” she says. “Looking at the numbers we had, it made sense for us to explore a different option.”
She says there are currently no plans to scrap the current Northfield facility, and they do have plans to use it.
“We’re looking at potentially using it with parks and recreation, the culture department, and other community groups that have an interest in it.
“It won’t be dormant and shuttered,” she says.
Pereboom says they are forecasting a spike in tourism this summer, and changing to a downtown location should spark engagement with everyone who comes to Nanaimo.
According to a report issued by the City of Nanaimo, all levels of tourism rose in 2022 from 2021 with hotels seeing an occupancy increase of 20.5 per cent bringing the 2022 total to 68.5 per cent.
