| However,
the real age of international mass travel began with the growth
of air travel after World War Two. In the immediate post-war
period, there was a surplus of transport aircraft, such as
the popular and reliable Douglas Dakota, and a number of ex
military pilots ready to fly them. They were available for
charter flights, and tour operators began to use them for
European destinations, such as Paris and Ostend.
Vladimir Raitz pioneered modern
package tourism when on 20 May 1950 his recently founded company,
Horizon, provided arrangements for a two-week holiday in Corsica.
For an all inclusive price of £32.10s.-, holiday makers
could sleep under canvas, sample local wines and eat a meal
containing meat twice a day - this was especially attractive
due to the continuing austerity measures in post-war United
Kingdom. Within ten years, his company had started mass tourism
to Palma (1952), Lourdes (1953), Costa Brava (1954), Sardinia
(1954), Minorca (1955), Porto (1956), Costa Blanca (1957)
and Costa del Sol (1959).
However it was with cheap air
travel in combination with the package tour that international
mass tourism developed. The postwar introduction of an international
system of airline regulation was another important factor.
The bilateral agreements at the heart of the system fixed
seat prices, and airlines could not fill blocks of empty seats
on underused flights by discounting. But if they were purchased
by a tour operator and hidden within the price of an inclusive
holiday package, it would be difficult to prove that discounting
had taken place - even though it was obvious that it had!
This was the origin of the modern mass package tour.
Another significant development
also happened at the end of this decade. The devaluation of
the Spanish peseta made Spain appear a particularly attractive
destination. The cheapness of the cost of living attracted
increasing numbers of visitors. Mass package tourism has at
times been an exploitative process, in which tour operators
in a country with a high standard of living make use of development
opportunities and low operating costs in a country with a
lower standard of living. However, as witness the development
of many tourist areas in previously poor parts of the world,
and the concomitant rise in standards of living, when there
is equality of bargaining power, both parties can gain economic
benefits from this arrangement.
Spain and the Balearic Islands
became major tourist destinations, and development probably
peaked in the 1980s. At the same time, British tour operators
developed the Algarve in Portugal. The continuing search for
new, cheaper, destinations spread mass tourism to the Greek
Islands, Italy, Tunisia, Morocco, parts of the coast of Turkey,
and more recently Croatia.
For the worker living in greater
London, Venice today is almost as accessible as Brighton was
100 years ago. Consequently, the British seaside resort experienced
a marked decline from the 1970s onwards. Some, such as New
Brighton, Merseyside have disappeared. Others have reinvented
themselves, and now cater to daytrippers and the weekend break
market.
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