FEARS are growing that the planned closure of the Dartmoor National Park visitor centre will lead to the death of Princetown village centre.
Businesses are worried the closure, due to a shortfall in Government funding to Dartmoor National Park Authority (DNPA), will make unviable for them to stay in the village and the economy will suffer and jobs be lost.
The former hotel not only physically dominates the centre of Princetown but is also a major plank in its economy. As one of the tourist highlights of Dartmoor, it attracts about 50,000 people annually who then support cafes, pubs, B&Bs, shops, the brewery and the prison museum.
DNPA leases the building from the Duchy of Cornwall but cannot afford to keep it open, despite extra grants in the past two years. Ideas to keep it open include generating more income and exploiting its Sherlock Holmes links.
Sam and husband Jim McNeill run climate expeditions from their outdoor clothing and equipment shop Basecamp in Princetown.
Sam said: “This news has come as shock. We’ll do anything we can to help it stay in some form or other. But the visitor centre is the heart of the village. It’s signposted off every main route and comes up in online searches as a destination. We have already had discussions about how viable it would be for us to stay if it closes. Our customers come here to explore the moor and others come to us for advice. Businesses here depend on each other and if the biggest common denominator is pulled, then there will be a domino effect. The closure is a cynical move regardless of the consequences.”
Rory Atton, of Dewerstone clothing, said: “We need a critical number of visitors to make it viable to stay in Princetown - this is very bad for the future of the economy and we’d have to consider our future here if it closed.”
Derek Robbins, who runs the Fox Tor Cafe, said: “Closing the visitor centre would be self-defeating for the national park and the Duchy. Surely the Duchy can help keep it open? We can stay open, but would probably see fewer customers with no visitor centre.”
The manager of the Plume of Feathers said: “Closure would be very bad for Princetown. It’s somewhere for coach tours to visit and for families visiting the prison inmates.”
Sir Geoffrey Cox, MP for Tavistock and Torridge, said: “Having secured hundreds of thousands of pounds in additional financial support in the past two years for the Dartmoor National Park Authority to enable it to remain open, I am deeply dismayed to learn of the decision of the DNPA to close the National Park Visitor Centre in Princetown next year.
“While I understand that the Labour Government has not been willing to make available similar additional support, and the DNPA must have regard to the responsible management of its reducing resources after the recent budget, the visitor centre is an important attraction to the village and its closure will be a serious setback to the community.”
