Tourist visits to the Whitsunday planning area

The following graphs show visitation to the Whitsunday Planning Area including full day visits, part day visits and visits by those who are exempt from paying the Environment Management Charge (EMC). Full day visits are the best gauge of the general trend of tourism in the Marine Park. The data is displayed by financial and calendar years and does not include coral viewing activities or scenic flights. Monthly data are also available in .csv format.

Visitation by financial year

Total visitation to the Whitsundays Planning Area including full day visits, part day visits and visits by those who are exempt from paying the Environment Management Charge (EMC), commencing July 1993, finishing June 2012, by financial year. From a total of 385,824 visitor days in the 1993-1994 financial year, visitation steadily increased to 546,369 visitor days in 1995-1996, before declining in 1996-1997 to 450,482 visitor days. Subsequently visitation increased steadily again, with 780,262 visitor days recorded for 2003-2004. Visitation then declined gradually to 724,803 visitor days in 2005-2006, before beginning to increase, peaking again at 786,214 visitor days in 2009-2010. A marked decline in visitation was seen in 2010-2011, with visitor days dropping to 685,400, followed by a slight increase in 2011-2012, with 692,641 visitor days recorded. 

Visitation by calendar year

Total visitation to the Whitsundays Planning Area including full day visits, part day visits and visits by those who are exempt from paying the Environment Management Charge (EMC), commencing July 1993, finishing December 2011, by calendar year. From a total of 437,055 visitor days recorded in 1994, visitation steadily increased to 517,862 visitor days in 1996, before declining in 1997 to 459,676 visitor days. Subsequently visitation increased steadily again, peaking at with 770,481 visitor days in 2004. Visitation then declined gradually to 731,902 visitor days in 2006, before beginning to increase, peaking again at 777,895 visitor days in 2009. A marked decline in visitation was seen in 2010, with visitor days dropping to 733,937, further decreasing to 663,876 visitor days in 2011.

Important information about this data

  1. The data represents visitors to the Great Barrier Reef who used commercial tourist operations.
  2. Data is updated quarterly following receipt of Environmental Management Charge returns from tourism operators.
  3. The count of visitor days to the Marine Park is calculated where passengers undertake a visit as follows:
    • Full day visits:
      • A day trip of more than three hours is recorded as a full day visit
      • Overnight trips are recorded as multiple full days, for example, a stay of two-days and one night is counted as two full day visits.
    • Part day visits:
      • Where the trip is less than three hours
      • The first day of a trip entering the Marine Park after 5 pm
      • The last day of a trip leaving the Marine Park before 6 am
    • Exempt visits are passengers who are not required to pay the Environmental Management Charge (EMC), for example:
      • Young children who are free-of-charge
      • Trade familiarisation passengers who are free-of-charge
      • Passengers for whom another operator has already paid EMC on that day
      • The fourth and subsequent days for passengers on extended charters.
  4. The data for 1993 represents six months visitation as data collection commenced in July 1993.
  5. Recording part day visits began in the fourth quarter of 2001.  These figures were previously included with the full day visits.
  6. The recording of coral viewing activities (for example, glass bottom boat tours) commenced in July 2007. This data is not included in the graph (above).
  7. The recording of scenic flights commenced in October 2009. This data is not included in the graph (above).
  8. The data does not include transfer passengers (for example ferry passengers).
  9. The data presented has not been validated. 
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