Tourism in New Orleans has regained most of the punch it had before Hurricane Katrina hit five years ago, and the sector has led the city's economic recovery since the storm, economic development officials say.
New Orleans' long-term goal is to have a diversified economy -- but the city is not there yet, Stephen Perry, president of the New Orleans Metropolitan Convention and Visitors Bureau, said recently.
For now, he said, it's tourists lining up at museums, taking tours, dining at restaurants and making that trademark stroll down Bourbon Street with a drink in hand. All have put people back to work and money back in city coffers, Perry said.
"In the short term and in the mid term, it was clear the culture and tourist industries would be the big difference in getting back on our feet," Perry said. "It not only put a lot of middle class people in the city back to work, it had a tremendous impact on the tax revenue."
Tourism contributes close to 30 percent of the New Orleans operating budget through the hotel occupancy taxes and sales taxes. Perry estimated that tourism, a $5 billion industry before Katrina, has regained about 82 percent of its pre-storm punch.
The Aquarium of the Americas was wrecked by the hurricane and lost all of its sea life in the weeks after. The staff managed to save penguins and sea otters before evacuating. Nine months later, Patience the Penguin waddled through the front doors of the Aquarium, and visitors were not far behind.
"When you consider the damage done to the building and the losses we had, it was amazing that we could get back that quickly," said aquarium vice president Karyn Kearney.
Attendance is about 80 percent of the pre-storm figure. According to University of New Orleans data, the Aquarium drew almost 596,000 in 2007, 631,000 in 2008 and 737,000 in 2009,
"We're budgeted this year for 754,000 visitors," Kearney said. "And we'll make that easily."
The city had 7.5 million visitors in 2009, compared to a typical pre-storm year of 8.5 million, according to Perry's agency.
Hotel occupancy January through May was up 13.1 percent from last year and rates were up 2.3 percent in the French Quarter and central business district, said Jan Freitag of Smith Travel Research.
Convention business is on track to return to normal, Perry said. It declined this year, because big conventions are normally booked five years in advance, and no one was willing to make that commitment after Katrina, he said.
"In the fall of 2005 we were booking for 2010 and 2011," Perry said. "Or would have been, but you can't book conventions when your convention center is in shambles."
The biggest problem attracting tourist to New Orleans after Katrina was one of perception, Perry said. Video of the flood waters that filled 80 percent of the city were shown on television and the Internet for months after the storm.
"People thought we were still flooded long after the hurricane, long after the flood waters were gone," Perry said.
That problem resurfaced after the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico, he said. Although the spill has not directly affected the city, he said the many stories carrying a New Orleans dateline gives the impression it has. And he said, the perception that Louisiana seafood may be tainted has kept away many that visit just to dine at the city's restaurants, which accounts for about a third of the tourism.
"We were having the best six months we have had since Katrina, and then the oil spill came along," Perry said. "And now we're battling an image problem again."
(Copyright 2010 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
