STAG Begins to Lock Horns

It seems that slowly, but surely, the Shrewton Traffic Action Group (STAG) is gaining traction.  In doing so, the Press are beginning to take an interest and that is beginning to get officialdom taking things a little more seriously than they have so far.  They'd better - this is only the beginning.

Both last week and this week, there was some excellent publicity in the Salisbury Journal in relation to the STAG petition and taking it to 10 Downing Street.  This morning, STAG were interviewed by Spire FM and it seems that English Heritage want an informal chat with STAG tomorrow...

...now that will be interesting.  Will it be to offer support for a plan to re-open the A344?  Support for a "cut and shut" two-level dual carriageway past the stones on the route of the original A303 maybe?  To deliver news that Stonehenge has been sold to the Disney Corporation and is being shipped to a more suitable site in the Nevada Desert perhaps.  Or is it just to express their concern that attention is being drawn to the Free Local Residents Passes?

After all, if each of the 30,000 adults in the local area who seem to be eligible for the passes take up the scheme and each takes just one child to visit Stonehenge, just once a year, then this would add 60,000 visitors to the Stonhenge annual visitor statistics.   Put another way, that is a minimum of £384,000 in lost revenues.  If each local visit were to involve 2 adults accompanying 6 children, then the loss could be nearly £700,000 per annum.   Stonehenge gets around 900,000 visitors a year - so if these locals visited Stonehenge just once a year it would represent around 13% of the annual visitors to Stonehenge. Ouch!   If they visit once a month, they will be in the majority and represent a 2-year potential loss of revenue to English Heritage of £16.8 million.

Whatever English Heritage claim to be their motivation to meet with STAG, you might guess that numbers like these would be influencing their thinking - at least a little.