UK Tourist Spots See Visitor Numbers Crash

The UK´s top tourist attractions took a nosedive in visitor numbers during 2005, new figures reveal. The Association of Leading Visitor Attractions (ALVA), which oversees the running of the nation´s favorite sites, confirmed that the top nine most popular attractions all lost visitors.

The National Gallery, the Tate Modern and the London Eye, three of the top ten most popular sites in the UK, experienced the most severe declines, of 15.2 percent, 12.1 percent and 12 percent, respectively.

Blackpool Pleasure Beach remains the most visited site with a total of 5,970,000 visitors, despite experiencing a 3.3 percent fall in numbers, while the British Museum, the second most popular attraction, saw numbers fall 6.8 percent to 4,536,064.

ALVA director Robin Broke responded to the results by pointing to the tragic July 7th bombings in London, which left 52 people dead, as reason why numbers have fallen so drastically.

ALVA has also suggested that reason for overall decline is because “the social environment in which tourism operates is of increasing concern”.