Mass Travel

Mass travel could not really begin to develop until two things oc­curred.

a) Improvements in technology allowed the transport of large num­bers of people in a short space of time to places of leisure interest, and

Английский язык для турбизнеса и сервиса

b) Greater numbers of people began to enjoy the benefits of leisure time. A major development was the invention of the railways, which brought many of Britain's seaside towns within easy distance of Britain's urban centres.

The father of modern mass tourism was Thomas Cook who, on 5 July 1841, organized the first package tour in history, by chartering a train to take a group of temperance campaigners from Leicester to a rally in Loughborough, some twenty miles away. Cook immediately saw the po­tential for business development in the sector, and became the world's first tour operator.

He was soon followed by others, with the result that the tourist in­dustry developed rapidly in early Victorian Britain. Initially it was sup­ported by the growing middle classes, who had time off from their work, and who could afford the luxury of travel and possibly even staying for periods of time in boarding houses.

However, the Bank Holiday Act 1871 introduced a statutory right for workers to take holidays, even if they were not paid at the time. (As an aside, in the UK there is still no obligation to pay staff who do not work on public holidays.)

The combination of short holiday periods, travel facilities and dis­tances meant that the first holiday resorts to develop in Britain were towns on the seaside, situated as close as possible to the growing industrial conurbations.

For those in the industrial north, there were Blackpool in Lancash­ire, and Scarborough in Yorkshire. For those in the Midlands, there were Weston-super-Mare in Somerset and Skegness in Lincolnshire, for those in London there were Southend-on-Sea, Broadstairs, Brighton, East­bourne, and a whole collection of other places.

In travelling to the coast, the population was following in the steps of Royalty. King George III is widely acknowledged as popularising the seaside holiday, due to his regular visits to Vteymouth when in poor health.

For a century, domestic tourism was the norm, with foreign travel being reserved, as before* for the rich or the culturally curious. A minor­ity of resorts, such as Bath, Harrogate and Matlock, emerged inland. After World War II holiday villages such as Butlins and Pontins emerged, but their popularity waned with the rise of package tours and the increas­ing comforts to which visitors became accustomed at home. Towards the end of the 20^th century the market was revived by the upmarket inland resorts of Dutch company Centre Pares.

Other phenomena that helped develop the travel industry were paid holidays:

Unit 1. Forms Of Tourism

• 1.5 million manual workers in Britain had paid holidays by 1925;

• 11 million by 1939 (30 % of the population in families with paid holidays).