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Directors of the Top Gear Festival say the R15 million the eThekwini municipality will spend bringing the festival to Durban for three years will be well spent, because the city can expect an estimated economic spinoff of more than R59m and extensive exposure this year alone. <\/p>\n
The festival directors yesterday briefed the eThekwini council\u2019s economic development committee on the projected economic impact of the event, which would be held in June. <\/p>\n
Hannah Cabral and Jamie Graham said the Durban event was expected to be a bigger and better organised spectacle at the Moses Mabhida Stadium than its Joburg predecessor. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re keeping the details under wraps for now. We have intentionally been quiet ahead of a big official launch on February 21, when all will be revealed to the media and public\u2026 It\u2019s going to be a stunning event in Durban, and more than you can imagine,\u201d said Cabral. <\/p>\n
Graham said people did not have all the information on the festival, which led to the uncertainty and scepticism over the event. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to put on the best event Durban has ever seen, and we want to ensure we get it right,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
Cabral said the first Top Gear Festival in SA, held in Joburg last year, had attracted more than 76 000 visitors and 8 000 hospitality patrons. <\/p>\n
She claimed that around 25 000 visitors to the Joburg event, staged at Kyalami, had been from Durban and KwaZulu-Natal. <\/p>\n
\u201cUsing these figures, combined with the knowledge that Top Gear Festivals attract many thousands of inter-province and out of town visitors internationally, we are able to project the economic impact the event will have on Durban,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
\u201cDurban can expect around 25 000 motor racing fans from outside the city over the festival weekend. Over the two days, 25 000 people in 12 500 hotel rooms at an average room rate of R1 000 a night equates to R25m. We estimate their spending on entertainment, food and drinks at another R20m. These figures exclude money spent by service providers for the event,\u201d added Cabral. <\/p>\n
An expected 3 000 hospitality industry patrons are expected to spend R14m more, while the hosting of motor-related sideshows and conferences would result in a total estimated economic impact of R59m. Cabral said most of the organisers\u2019 budget would be spent locally. <\/p>\n
The city and KZN provincial government are expected to split the R30m bill to host the festival over the next three years. <\/p>\n
Perfect <\/p>\n
Questioned by committee members about the Joburg event, Graham said it had been a sell-out success. However, he said there had been problems relating to infrastructure at Kyalami and it had rained during the event. <\/p>\n
\u201cMoses Mabhida Stadium is going to be an incredible venue and the weather in Durban in June is perfect for such an event. We\u2019ve also had outstanding support from the city and province,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n
DA councillor and committee member Nicole Graham said she was happy with what she had heard from the festival directors yesterday. <\/p>\n
\u201cI am cautiously optimistic now and wait to hear more,\u201d she said. <\/p>\n
Durban Tourism CEO Phillip Sithole said the city had the support of the Durban Chamber of Commerce and Industry as well as the hospitality industry to host the event. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Directors of the Top Gear Festival say the R15 million the eThekwini municipality will spend bringing the festival to Durban for three years will be well spent, because the city can expect an estimated economic spinoff of more than R59m and extensive exposure this year alone. The festival directors yesterday briefed the eThekwini council\u2019s economic […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[8275,953,2143],"class_list":{"0":"post-7647","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-durban","8":"tag-newspaper","9":"tag-the-mercury","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7647","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7647"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7647\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7647"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7647"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7647"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}