Tourists sidestep Sydney

TOURISM spending in Sydney has plummeted but the city’s loss has been a win for regional NSW where there has been an enormous 45 per cent increase in visitors.

In the year to February, tourists’ overnight spending in Sydney was down $315m, or 51 per cent, to just $300m, according to Tourism Research Australia statistics.

Visitors fell 36 per cent to 538,000. In regional NSW, overnight spending increased by $331m to $1.1bn.

Visitors increased cent to two million.

Tourism Accommodation Australia chief Michael Johnson said regions were leading the COVID-19 tourism recovery.

“Australians love to travel and with a lot of pent-up demand due to border closures, they’re taking every opportunity to go into the regions,” he said.

Mr Johnson said occupancy rates in Port Macquarie, on the NSW mid-north coast, were up about 90 per cent but it was a “different story” in Sydney, where most of the city’s 30,000 hotels had languished at 50 per cent full.

“Sydney is a gateway city, so many international travellers enter there and stay a few nights, there’s huge conferences and other major events that would normally bring in visitors, but not at the moment,” he said.

The NSW government will next month offer $100 accommodation vouchers that can be used to stay in Sydney. 23 per