Shipspotting market ?

[Jean Hemond]

 I am presently writing a short paper on the potential interest in local tourism organization to  upgrade of the local bridge walkways. The  Quebec bridge it self being of clear historic  and touristic value.
I would like to put numbers on the eventual ship spotting activites. Here I believe in Quebec and Canada  ship watching  is still in its infancy when compared to EU .
Likely some of you can provide figures of ships pictures on the Web, Number of ship spotting users on the web. Number of travel for that purpose , number of tourists. there are a few similar bridges used for ship spotting. Likely the authorities have some ideas about the economic impact how ever limited.   For  example how many people do visit Rotterdam  intending ship photography?  
My idea is to compare our activity with the relative impact of bird watching and project interest growth of this hobby.
 Anybody with ideas on this subject?

[Riverman2903]

Hello Jean,

Sounds like an interesting project and I wish you luck. I cannot comment on numbers of ship Spotters/Photographers in the world, but as far as the UK is concerned, ship spotting is very much a minority activity and at a guess it's probably only a few thousand out a population of 60million? If you check Facebook for shipping groups you can see how many members each group has, you could also contact the World Ship Society to ask how many members they have. I still belong to the Thames Ship Society (although I am no longer anywhere near the Thames!) and I think they have around 300 members so numbers are not great. There are many reasons why numbers so small but two main reasons are (1) fewer places to see ships as most ports are now in isolated locations away from most people, and (2) security...even if you live near a port the ships are now hidden away behind fences and security guards!!

I think perhaps any economic benefits from ship spotters are minimal (unless you have a hotel or B&B overlooking a busy river!!) so I would be inclined not to mention us but instead mention general tourism and health benefits of being able to walk across bridges, and of course general tourists will take photographs of ships if they see one passing.

I'm sorry if this sounds negative reply, I would be happy to give you further thoughts if you think it may help.

Andrew

ps. Sorry, just a paranoid thought, but if you are publishing details of bridges where ships can be seen passing then you may attract attention of the security services, it's the world we now live in I am afraid, in the UK we have laws that prevent you from having information "of use to terrorists".....whatever that means!

[Jean Hemond]

 Thank you Riverman I am  at first  consideration tempted to agree with you.
 Except that I came across an info about  shipping container spotting . Apparently they at one of the lines have a 1.5 million follower on that site.  A rather un-interesting thing. Train spotting was said to reach 100 000 enthusiast in UK alone.  The shipspotting is all the more interesting with the paranoia. Just like watching the big game in photo safaris.  And as the world economy is relying on maritime transport for more than 80% of goods ( tons-miles) It is an excellent way to illustrate the real business of the world not a trivial hobby at all.
I once had the stats on my own web site now closed  not properly referenced by Google search And there and by far the two main visitors were US defence ( CIA) and a Russian obscured site  Navy I guess.   One could  just see the numbers on the container and trade marks on the deck cargo even on the small posted pictures. Imagine the full files.

I am rather "intrigued" to see that there is no comprehensive text about shipspotting on Wikip

[Jean Hemond]

 I found this statistic that gives some hope for shipspotting.
North American birders were estimated to have spent as much as US$32 billion in 2001. I think there  might be a  bright future for shipspotting. Not bad at all!