Huge shortfall in visitors to The Wave, figures show...

[dutchman]

The Wave, in Coventry city centre, has not attracted the visitor numbers anticipated, according to figures released to the BBC



A £36.7m council-funded water park has attracted about a million fewer visitors a year than was predicted in the years before it opened, the BBC has learnt.

The Wave, in Coventry city centre, was built by the city council and opened in October 2019.

But the attraction is closed to the majority of people for most of the year, with general admission only available in school holidays, Friday afternoons and weekends.

Despite this, the council insisted the attraction delivered a financial return for the taxpayer, pointing to the Covid pandemic as one of the reasons for the site's failure to deliver numbers as expected.

The water park was part of a wider shake up of the city's sports and leisure offering, which saw the 1960s Coventry Sports and Leisure Centre closed and replaced.

Forecasts of 1.3 milllion annual visitors were repeatedly published in council reports, external between 2014 and 2019, compared to about 800,000 each year at the old sports and leisure centre.

Those reports were used to inform the public and persuade councillors to approve building The Wave and closing the old site, despite thousands petitioning against the move.

But the BBC has now learnt those predictions were wide of the mark.

The council retains ownership of the site, with about 2.4m visits recorded over The Wave's first five full years of opening – just over a third of the 6.5m forecast.

Requests under the Freedom of Information Act revealed the park's first full year of opening in 2020 was its most successful, recording 979,000 visitors.

However the site's worst figures were recorded the following year, with 211,000 visits.

A total of 302,000 visits came in 2022; 420,000 in 2023; and 455,000 in 2024.

The park is occasionally opened for some specialist sessions, such as parent and toddler sessions, but general admission is restricted to Friday evenings and weekends during term time.

Councillor Gary Ridley, the Conservative opposition leader on the council, described the difference between the predicted figures and those recorded as "a huge chasm".

"We were either sold something that was never going to happen or, there is another theory, that it's not attracting the numbers it should," he said.

He questioned the policy around opening times adding it was "difficult to see how we are going to get 1.3million people visiting this facility if it's only open at certain times".

Ridley also said there were "questions that need to be answered" around the pricing structure for The Wave and how affordable it was for people.

A visit for a family of four would cost £56 - or £49.50 with a discount for those who live in Coventry.

CV Life, the organisation which operates the site and sets the prices and opening times, declined to comment when approached by the BBC.

[rebbonk]

Yet more evidence as to why the council should not run/own/operate such projects.

Of course, Cllr Off-the-Boyle was involved in this, wasn't he? The man is a walking disaster.

[dutchman]

The Wave 'too expensive and closed too often' says councillor in blistering attack



Too expensive and too often closed. That was the message from Coventry City Council’s Conservative leader after it was revealed that visitor numbers at The Wave were a fraction of what had been anticipated. It was hoped that the city centre attraction, described as one of the UK’s largest and newest indoor waterparks, would see 1.3m visitors every year but the actual number is around a third of that figure six years on from its opening.

In a written question to the cabinet member for public health and sport Cllr Kam Caan, Cllr Gary Ridley asked for an itemised breakdown of the actual annual visitor numbers along with the projected figure used in the original £36.7m business case. The figures show that from the 261,803 visitors in 2021/22 when there were times the centre was shut due to Covid, the numbers have risen to 458,295 in 2024/25.

Cllr Caan added: “Initial modelling work undertaken in 2014 projected that the provision of the new city centre destination facility would result in circa 1.3m visits to the facility per annum. The difference between the actual average visitor number per annum for the above period and the original annual projection is 922,249.

“It is noted that the initial modelling work undertaken in 2014 pre-dated both the detailed facility development and design work for The Wave and the council’s decision to invest in a new 50m swimming pool at the Alan Higgs Centre. The cabinet report of 12 February 2019, which requested approval of the acceptance of Sport England grant funding towards the new 50m swimming pool, provided a new projection of circa 2.4m annual visits across all the leisure estate, following the completion of these works.”

At the full council meeting, Cllr Ridley followed up his original question by asking: “As the cabinet member has confirmed the vast disparity between the projected 1.3m visitors and the actual attendance, can he state the total accumulative revenue shortfall of The Wave compared to the original forecast and will this council commit to being fully transparent about the current and future taxpayers subsidy required to cover the operational costs.”

And after pointing out that it costs up to £56 for a family of four to visit the attraction, he added: “How can The Wave ever hope to achieve the visitor numbers required based on the business model when its opening hours are demonstrably too low for a major regional attraction.”

Outside of school holidays, the centre open opens for just two hours on a Friday evening and at the weekend.

https://www.coventrytelegraph.net/news/coventry-news/visitor-shortfall-coventry-landmark-prompts-33009104