Final Essay: As Ambleside is a tourist honeypot the traffic in the summer will be higher and will create more problems for the residents such as noise, air pollution and parking.
The purpose of my final essay is to analyse the results produced by my diagrams, graphs, maps, sketches and photographs from my winter and summer visit.
Tax Disc Survey
As part of my winter study I performed a tax disc survey in two car parks (Waterhead and Hayes Garden Centre car parks). I studied and collected the results from 25 cars in each car park and recorded them on a catchments area map on the UK. My study showed me that most of the people that had vehicles parked in Ambleside local car parks were not from Ambleside but they were from the rest of the UK ( 60%).I recorded the results of my tax disc survey on two bar graphs and on a UK map. The results show me that most of the vehicles that are in Ambleside are all within a four hours journey time from Ambleside. From my results I was able to draw a catchment area circle on a UK map this shows where all of the vehicles that were in Ambleside have come from and the travelling range that they were each from i.e. 2hr and 4hr travelling time from Ambleside. Out of the 50 cars that were recorded only two of them came from places that were within 4 hours journey time from Ambleside and the rest were within 2 hours journey time i.e. day-trippers. This may be due to a few reasons, such as accessibility to Ambleside is very good. Ambleside is only six hours drive or five hours rail from London, less than two hours from Manchester or Liverpool, one hour from the Scottish border. It has great access provided by main roads (A591, A593) and also from rail. It is also connected to motorways such as M6, which is good as motorways have four lanes in them which reduces the journey time and means that more people are likely to visit. The location of Ambleside and its easy and available access means that day trips to Ambleside from places such as Scotland, Manchester and London are easily available and quite common. This has helped to build up Ambleside as a tourist honeypot and means that more tourists now travel and stay in ambleside (see catchment area map). The quick access means that people of all ages now can travel to Ambleside not just people with vehicles. These results affect my investigation as they were recorded in the winter and it does not provide that much information as to the amount of people that travel to Ambleside and the amount of people that are only tourists to Ambleside in the summer, it does however allow me to see that most of the vehicles in local Ambleside car parks are not just from Ambleside. It suggests that there may be a traffic problem in Ambleside i.e. high levels of traffic even in winter season. The results are not very reliable as it does not show me how many tourist travel through Ambleside and do not stop.
Building Survey
Also as part of my winter visit to Ambleside I completed a building survey on three streets in Ambleside. Compston Rd (CBD), Lake Road south (Tourist Services Area) and Waterhead Road (Main Tourists Area.) For each building I recorded the name, use, height and quality. I used percentage squares (pg 21) and a table (pg 15-20)to show the building use for each street, bar charts (pg 24) for the building height and star diagrams (pg 25,26) for the building quality. On Waterhead and Lake rd south most of the buildings were houses and hotels/ bed & breakfast’s. ( Waterhead 32% houses, 12% hotels/bed & breakfast. Lake Rd South 56% houses and 19% hotels/bed and breakfast. On Waterhead there was also a majority of tourist services (23 %) this number of tourist services decreased to 0 as Waterhead joined on to Lake road south where the number of houses and hotels/ B & B’s increased. This was because lake road south was a main road that led directly in to the CBD. The number of Hotels/ B&B’s increased because it was a very busy and suitable place as it is located in between the lake and CBD. There was also a number of shops such as chain stores e.g. Boots, Millets and residential services such as newsagents and grocery shops e.g. Spar and a Village store which suggest that this street despite being in the tourist services area was mainly used by local residents. Compston Rd had a smaller number of houses and a larger number of Hotels/B&B’s and shops. These shops were not just for local residents as many of them were chain stores, souvenir shops and sold outdoor clothing suitable for tourist going on hikes and outings around Lake Windermere. Also on Compston Rd the buildings were together in groups, e.g. all of the shops were together at the top while all of the houses and hotel/B&B’s were at the lower end of the street. My results show me that most of the tourists were likely to stay in the CBD as it has much more room for them to stay and great access via Lake Rd south to the lake. It is also the busiest with many shops and services for mainly tourists but also for local residents. It also helps to show me that Ambleside is a tourist honey pot as most of the buildings in the CBD are tourist shops and B&B’s, Closer to the lake there are many buildings that are tourist services i.e. tourist information kiosks and hire shops for bikes, hiking equipment and boats.
