Southport (UK) awarded world's friendliest group tourism destination

Every two years, the International Road Transport Union (IRU) recognises public and private companies in the bus and coach industry for their innovation, best practices and excellence towards facilitating and promoting sustainable mobility.

The 40^th anniversary of Busworld in Kortrijk, Belgium set the scene to reward the winners of the IRU City Trophy 2011.

“we have been working closely with the travel trade for ten years now and it’s wonderful that all the hard work undertaken by our tourism team has been recognised with this international award. The economic impact of coach visits to Southport cannot be underestimated and for many hotels and retailers it is a substantial part of their business.”
From left to right: IRU Secretary General, Martin Marmy, Mike Booth, Sefton Council's Cabinet Member for Leisure, Culture & Tourism, Julia Fahey, Southport's Travel Trade Officer, and IRU Vice President, Graham Smith.

The UK resort of Southport received the IRU City Trophy 2011 as the world's most friendly city for group tourism. Their transport policy over the last decade has almost doubledthe number of visiting tourist coaches (from 2883 to 5252) between 2000-2010.

The excellence of Southport’s services offered to coach drivers, weighed in the international jury’s decision. The city provides quality parking facilities, assistance and accommodation, meet-and-greet services and information for drivers and tourists.

The IRU City Trophy is awarded biennially. It acknowledges and rewards municipal authorities across the world that implement exemplary proactive policies favouring sustainable group tourism by coach.

• Visit Southport's website

• Read the Press release

• Download high res pictures

Read the "IRU City Trophy 2011" winner's application's file

Runner-up: City of Helsingborg