A blessing in disguise

Jessica Mello.

Our analysis showed that in the best case scenario where Dubai could attain and build on its objective of 15 million tourists by 2015, while growing theme park visitation to the Gold Coast level (0.75 visits per head), Dubai could achieve just over 18 million annual attractions visits by 2020.

The cautious scenario (reaching 0.35 visits per head) suggested a level of 8 million visits was attainable. This was far fewer than the combined target attendance of more than 30 million.

Dubai was planning too many theme parks and if all went ahead, competition would have been fierce. The impact of too few visitors would be empty attractions, heavy discounting, low revenues, insufficient funds for refurbishment, deteriorating quality and a negative public perception of the destination — a roller coaster ghost town — and this is not what Dubai wanted to become.

Wouldn’t it be better for Dubai to avoid such an Ozymandian fate and only build a few high quality theme parks to begin with? That’s the ironic opportunity Dubai now has.

The credit crunch has led to a number of attraction projects being put on hold or cancelled. While it’s still unclear which will go ahead, it’s likely that only two or three will appear, and these would be enough to create critical mass, yet meet demand in the market.

So while the world is reeling, the financial situation actually presents a great opportunity for Dubai to regroup and develop a more realistic and strategic development plan for its tourism infrastructure.

Dubai has grown fast and is now entering a more mature phase in its development. The time is ripe to take a mature view of the future, continue to build on the phenomenal success of the past 10 years and establish a solid base for future growth.

Economic Research Associates (ERA) is the world’s oldest and largest leisure and tourism consultancy, and has worked extensively in Dubai and the region.

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