THE ORGANISER of the last stage of the World Rally Championship has defended the decision to charge spectators either €25 or €30 to view the race.
The rally, starting tonight, ends in Donegal town on Sunday at lunchtime with a “super special stage” section in the town centre.
This stage will be a 1.5km time trial, a distance which will take the drivers just over a minute to complete. Spectators will pay a charge to enter either the finish line grandstand or the Diamond.
Rally fans have questioned the charges, but Cllr Jonathan Kennedy said it would go to defray the €100,000 cost of staging the last part of the rally in the town, and that such a charge was normal for a super special stage.
“If you go to a super special stage in Rally GB (Great Britain), you’ll pay £50 sterling just to get into the stadium. We have entertainment going on from 10.30am, we got the old rally cars display, we have a samba band and three large screens to show the action. The whole town is going to be wired for a PA system,” he said.
“It is just in two small areas. Everywhere else around the town is free,” he said.
The event begins tonight with a ceremonial start in Enniskillen, Co Fermanagh. The racing starts tomorrow morning in Glenboy, Co Leitrim, and finishes up in darkness in Co Tyrone where there will be two night-time stages.
On Saturday the rally will travel from Sligo to Tyrone, and on Sunday the stages will run through Leitrim and Sligo before heading north to Donegal Bay for the final event stage. The weather forecast for the weekend is bad, making conditions more challenging.
About 250,000 spectators, including 36,000 overseas visitors, watched the round of the WRC in Ireland in 2007. Similar numbers are expected this year.
Rally Ireland event director John Naylor said the event is “good news in a recession”, but was disappointed the average rate being charged by hotels was about €180-€195 a night for a twin room, significantly more than the norm for the time of year.
“I have appealed from the outset to hotels not to exploit the punter coming in here, but we have to look at it from the hoteliers’ point of view that they have a chance to make some money in a lean time. We can bring this event back year after year if people can get good value.” He defended charges for the last stage. “Anywhere else you are charged into every stage. We are unique that we close public roads and it is a free show. A small group of people have done tremendous work in raising money to make this town stage happen and in order to recoup that they are charging purely to cover the costs.”
Fáilte Ireland northwest spokesman Martin Donnelly said several hotels in Sligo, the host town, are sold out. Other parts of the route are “very near capacity” with BBs faring well. He said: “The market dictates the value of a room. If there is some incidences of overcharging, they would be struggling to fill themselves out.”
For more information see www.rallyireland.org
