A large part of the metro vision focuses on jobs, and in the city that means a concentration of efforts at selling Belize City as a tourist destination. With cruise tourism numbers up to as many as 290 thousand cruise ship passengers; there's suddenly a great cash driven demand on infrastructure in Belize City. Sure there's a tourist village, but what happens when the tourists get outsidethose gates? Many times, those visitors get lost, and to make sure they don't, the Tourism Board has taken on the task of ensuring that the visitors don't lose their way in the city. Anthony Mahler,Director of Product Development with the BTB explains the latest signs initiative launched as the city is being transformed into a visitor's hub:
Anthony Mahler
Definitely, from the response that we've gotten, from the signs that we've installed so far, people say that it makes a big difference especially making it easier to travel and you feel more comfortable in a destination because you know where you are going if you are looking for something. Well actually, we've had an on-going signs project for the last two or three years where you see all the overhead signs in or around Belize City. We're responsible for implementing or installing those signs. This phase of the project is geared towards, specifically to cruise passengers. Over the last few years we have seen a tremendous growth, and especially this year where we are going to see close to three hundred thousand cruise passengers come to Belizean waters. We had some officials from the cruise lines come in and they were assessing Belize City and the country on a whole for when their ships come in and they said that signage was a big problem, so we moved on that quickly and the signs that you see around town right now is just to address the need that we see for signs.
Eight signs have been placed in the city to direct tourists to various destinations including downtown Belize City, the Museum and the Tourist Village among others. The initiative forms part of a larger plan, which has seen the installation of similar overhead signs on major roads and highways.