That's great news. But we sure need more tourists. Toronto has to market itself more and pay to have articles written about it in travel magazines. It's very rare that I see anything about toronto in these magazines, whereas Sydney or Rome or Paris or ny always have a write up. I'm sure they pay for them.
The thing with Toronto's tourism is that being a newer city we lack something more iconic, beside the CN Tower, that distinguish Toronto from everyone else. Even a cliche tourist trap is better than nothing at all. People need to associate something special with Toronto and just Toronto to visit us, rather than, say Chicago or San Francisco.
Being close to Lake Ontario apparently hasn't become a selling point when it comes to tourism at all. Nobody is gonna rank Toronto' waterfront scene in terms of beauty ahead of Chicago's, which is closeby, not to mention so many large cities are either by the sea or by a river. Water is NOT special.
Our museums are second class just to be very honest, and they charge an arm and a leg, compared with the Metropolitan, MoMa, even le Louvre etc. Don't make excuses such as we are less subsidized etc. The tourists don't care. The sheer fact that Casa Loma charges $18 is pretty shocking in terms of what it offers. Even our super mini "shoe museum", which takes about 20 minutes to see, charges $14 if I am not mistaken. For someone well travelled, why should tourists spend $14 in that, compared with le Louvre, which charges similar price (10 euro)?
Yes, we have vibrant "neighbourhoods", but just by looking at how many other cities claim themselves to be "a city of neibourhoods" we can know that won't be a selling point either. How does busy Queen West stack up with SoHo in NYC, Oxford st in London, or Newbury St in Boston? Not that impressive either. Chinatown, Korea Town, Little Italy etc, if you travel enough, you have already seen enough of them, and they are all similar.
Our architecture is not strong either to be fair. Woodbine Beach is cool for locals, but let's be honest, we are not a tropical resort. People seldom come to Toronto for the beach scene.
As to the CN tower, all I can say is that it is way too pricy for what it delivers. There are so many really highbuildings for people to go up and see in the world, but CN is one of the most expensive, and there is too little offered at the top there for the hype.
The Hockey Hall of Fame is a very Canadian thing. However, how many hockey fans are there outside Canada? I myself haven't been there due to lack of interest.
On the other hand, we do have some decent theatres, restaurants etc. But I am afraid that's not enough.
Most tourists need something special about a place, something you don't see elsewhere, to be excited about, to take photos of. They don't usually care much about livable neighbourhoods as they are not living here. Even something tacky, let it be a giant ferris wheel, or a 7 star casino, is better than nothing, and I am saying it from a pure tourist perspective, not to say constructing them makes economic sense.
Street events are fun for local residents, but I don't think they help with tourism that much, unless it is really world famous, like the Rio Carnival. Nobody would fly to a foreign country just to see Nuit Blanche or Caribana.
All that being said, Toronto doesn't really excel in the tourism section because we don't have enough "touristy", which ordinary people like. If the city does envision to be a bigger tourist city, a lot is needed.
I've read mixed reviews about the tour ranging from something thats worth the price to something thats a tacky tourist trap.
