I loved his comment about everything being left to the last minute for the 2006 Asian Games : "Some of them finished after the Asian Games." Many of the hotels are STILL not finished, such as the City Center hotels. These were projects that were needed for 2006 and here we are, 5 years later, only coming close to completing them.
And what is the deal with the Aspire Tower hotel? It's kind of embarrassing to think how much money was poured into building the tower, and it's still sitting there, empty, and doing nothing other than attracting moths to the bright lights.
Perhaps there are some exciting tourism related projects in the pipeline, like a world class water park, or amusement park, but in my opinion, countries either have tourist industries based on history, or leisure. Either you have a city full of beautiful old buildings, like the Taj Mahal or religious temples, castles and historic precincts, or you have exciting amusements and decent nightlife. I'm not sure what Qatar plans to use to lure tourists here. The QTA remarks seem to assume that people will be flying through the airport and will just decide to stay in Qatar, by accident, without any reason.
I'm not sure what the QTA actually thinks people would want to come to Qatar to do. And I wonder if they have ever taken the time to study their market and ask tourists why they would want to come here.
Spending all this money on what will probably be an amazing airport, only to tell the bulk of travellers (the budget conscious) that they aren't welcome in Qatar seems foolish to me.
I loved his comment about everything being left to the last minute for the 2006 Asian Games : "Some of them finished after the Asian Games." Many of the hotels are STILL not finished, such as the City Center hotels. These were projects that were needed for 2006 and here we are, 5 years later, only coming close to completing them.
And what is the deal with the Aspire Tower hotel? It's kind of embarrassing to think how much money was poured into building the tower, and it's still sitting there, empty, and doing nothing other than attracting moths to the bright lights.
Perhaps there are some exciting tourism related projects in the pipeline, like a world class water park, or amusement park, but in my opinion, countries either have tourist industries based on history, or leisure. Either you have a city full of beautiful old buildings, like the Taj Mahal or religious temples, castles and historic precincts, or you have exciting amusements and decent nightlife. I'm not sure what Qatar plans to use to lure tourists here. The QTA remarks seem to assume that people will be flying through the airport and will just decide to stay in Qatar, by accident, without any reason.
I'm not sure what the QTA actually thinks people would want to come to Qatar to do. And I wonder if they have ever taken the time to study their market and ask tourists why they would want to come here.
Spending all this money on what will probably be an amazing airport, only to tell the bulk of travellers (the budget conscious) that they aren't welcome in Qatar seems foolish to me.