Forum to look at `Summer Wine' tourism

Oct 25 2003 By The Huddersfield Daily Examiner

TOURISM and its impact in the Holme Valley goes under the spotlight at a meeting next month.

Residents are being invited to give their views at the next meeting of Kirklees Council's area committee for Holme Valley South on November 4.

Holmfirth and its surrounding countryside has become a regular haunt for day trippers and walkers following the success of the BBC's flagship TV comedy Last Of The Summer Wine.

The meeting will look at the challenges which face the town and the effect tourism has on the economy, highways and parking issues.

Clr Ken Sims, acting chairman of the committee, said the economy of the area was increasingly based on tourism.

The closure of three local textile mills had strengthened this shift.

He said an economy based on tourism created a variety of problems.

Planners needed to see how the needs of visitors and local people could both be met and balanced.

The meeting will be at Holmfirth Civic Hall, Huddersfield Road, Holmfirth, at 7.30pm.