I don't think anybody has mentioned backpackers recently but the competitioon from backpackers must both reflect badly on YHa and lose them business.
There is quite a good private association of backpackers in SW city centres Exeter/Bristol/Bournemouth for example (search engine) and I would much prefer to stay in a dorm with a pretty girl in the next bed... than a snoring old raspberry, and they are much cheaper too.(the beds)
YHA closures
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mel
Re:YHA closures
Yesterday I received the renewal notice for my annual YHA sub and I have reluctantly decided not to renew this year. I haven't used the Hostels for a few years because they are closed when I have needed them (autumn/winter) and I can camp when they are open (spring/summer). However the thing that made my mind up about not rejoining was a TV programme where a YHA spokswoman was proudly announcing that alcohol was now available in Hostels.
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Jims
Re:YHA closures
Here is some GOOD NEWS. One hostel on the YHA mass cull list has been saved by a group of concerned volunteer wardens and others. Please look at
www.elenyddhostels.co.uk
They have sucessfully bought Ty'nCornel from the YHA for £125,000 and will continue to co-operate with YHA to run it as a youth hostel from February 2006, for at least 5 years. They group has been pledged 30,000 in small donations from 700 people so far and need to raise the rest over the next few years to pay back what amounts to a private loan. Next year they hope to bid for Dolgoch, when it comes on the market.
Secondly, at a meeting on Friday 4th August 2006, Pendle Borough Council agreed to make a purchase bid for Earby YHA The hoped intention is for YHA to continue day to day operation of the Earby hostel via a leaseback scheme from the Council. The purchase offer was made Mon 7th August 2006
Please lobby YHA like mad to accept this offer. Let’s all email Roger Clarke, YHA Chief Executive : rogerclarke@yha.org.uk
If possible copy in :
chrisboulton@yha.org.uk (YHA Chairman)
markfarmer@yha.org.uk (YHA Operations Director)
davewaugh@yha.org.uk (NW Regional Manager)
chris-hall@scarborough.co.uk (web manager to monitor responses)
Also, let's lobby other councils to follow Pendle Borough Council’s enlightened lead
Lets' not just whinge – but do something a difference.
www.elenyddhostels.co.uk
They have sucessfully bought Ty'nCornel from the YHA for £125,000 and will continue to co-operate with YHA to run it as a youth hostel from February 2006, for at least 5 years. They group has been pledged 30,000 in small donations from 700 people so far and need to raise the rest over the next few years to pay back what amounts to a private loan. Next year they hope to bid for Dolgoch, when it comes on the market.
Secondly, at a meeting on Friday 4th August 2006, Pendle Borough Council agreed to make a purchase bid for Earby YHA The hoped intention is for YHA to continue day to day operation of the Earby hostel via a leaseback scheme from the Council. The purchase offer was made Mon 7th August 2006
Please lobby YHA like mad to accept this offer. Let’s all email Roger Clarke, YHA Chief Executive : rogerclarke@yha.org.uk
If possible copy in :
chrisboulton@yha.org.uk (YHA Chairman)
markfarmer@yha.org.uk (YHA Operations Director)
davewaugh@yha.org.uk (NW Regional Manager)
chris-hall@scarborough.co.uk (web manager to monitor responses)
Also, let's lobby other councils to follow Pendle Borough Council’s enlightened lead
Lets' not just whinge – but do something a difference.
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horizon
Re:YHA closures
I just wanted to put my finger on why these closures are so painful when other accommodation is so plentiful and often much better.
Maybe it's because youth hostels were:
1. Cheap: geared to low costs using bunks, self-catering, keeping them simple, using donated buildings, doing a chore, voluntary maintenance work etc.
2. Fascinating: fabulously diverse and interesting buildings, most of them old, unusual and untampered with. Most were part of the landscape both rural and urban -musty old places that had roots in the area around them.
3. Bookable and reachable: a handbook with maps and information that let you plan a journey of just a few miles or several hundred.
4. For like minded people: promising a chat in a common room or just a quiet read around the fire.
5. For outdoors people: welcoming of bikes, boots and rucksacks and offering you drying and storage space and somewhere to put the bike.
6. Sufficient: a clean, warm and comfortable roof over your head without having to carry camping gear.
7. Consistent: utterly predictable, supervised and safe, a reliable destination during a challenging day, especially for young people.
8. Connectable: a widespread but dense and logical network that you could reach on foot or by bike.
9. Flexible: large enough to accommodate groups and families but able to take individuals, old and young.
10. Open to all: you didn't have to be a scout or live in a certain area or go to a particular school or book a holiday to use a hostel.
11. Located in the best places: where sometimes only a youth hostel would be allowed, or far off the beaten track.
12. Unique: getting that card stamped was sheer heaven.
Please could anyone tell me if any other facility, company, organisation, building, chain, group, website, network, centre, hotel, association, department, guest house, corporation, campsite, authority or person can offer the same combination?
I don't think so.
Maybe it's because youth hostels were:
1. Cheap: geared to low costs using bunks, self-catering, keeping them simple, using donated buildings, doing a chore, voluntary maintenance work etc.
2. Fascinating: fabulously diverse and interesting buildings, most of them old, unusual and untampered with. Most were part of the landscape both rural and urban -musty old places that had roots in the area around them.
3. Bookable and reachable: a handbook with maps and information that let you plan a journey of just a few miles or several hundred.
4. For like minded people: promising a chat in a common room or just a quiet read around the fire.
5. For outdoors people: welcoming of bikes, boots and rucksacks and offering you drying and storage space and somewhere to put the bike.
6. Sufficient: a clean, warm and comfortable roof over your head without having to carry camping gear.
7. Consistent: utterly predictable, supervised and safe, a reliable destination during a challenging day, especially for young people.
8. Connectable: a widespread but dense and logical network that you could reach on foot or by bike.
9. Flexible: large enough to accommodate groups and families but able to take individuals, old and young.
10. Open to all: you didn't have to be a scout or live in a certain area or go to a particular school or book a holiday to use a hostel.
11. Located in the best places: where sometimes only a youth hostel would be allowed, or far off the beaten track.
12. Unique: getting that card stamped was sheer heaven.
Please could anyone tell me if any other facility, company, organisation, building, chain, group, website, network, centre, hotel, association, department, guest house, corporation, campsite, authority or person can offer the same combination?
I don't think so.
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horizon
Re:YHA closures
jims: your weblink should read:
www.elenydd-hostels.co.uk (don't forget the hyphen)
To see the real magic of the YHA (and what they are currently wantonly discarding) please visit this website.
www.elenydd-hostels.co.uk (don't forget the hyphen)
To see the real magic of the YHA (and what they are currently wantonly discarding) please visit this website.
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Karen Sutton
Re:YHA closures
horizon you are so right. This is exactly why these closures are so painful. We can find alternative accomodation but many of us would prefer not to for the reasons you have stated. Loss of the following is the problem:
Cheap- they are no longer that. Impending loss of self catering choice will make them even less cheap.
Bookable and reachable. The stated discontinuation of the handbook will be a blow to this.
Connectable- loss of so much of the network means this is no longer the case.
Flexible- no longer this either. Total use of a hostel by a school group means that even if 50% of the beds are used, small groups and families are turned away. OK so they want to encourage youg people to stay, but that shouldn't exclude the young people who travel with their parents. Local closing periods outside peak times means loss of flexibility as well.
Located in best places- the number of these is gradually diminishing.
Cheap- they are no longer that. Impending loss of self catering choice will make them even less cheap.
Bookable and reachable. The stated discontinuation of the handbook will be a blow to this.
Connectable- loss of so much of the network means this is no longer the case.
Flexible- no longer this either. Total use of a hostel by a school group means that even if 50% of the beds are used, small groups and families are turned away. OK so they want to encourage youg people to stay, but that shouldn't exclude the young people who travel with their parents. Local closing periods outside peak times means loss of flexibility as well.
Located in best places- the number of these is gradually diminishing.
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20 incher
Re:YHA closures
sad to say but Scottish hostels seem to be following a similar trend.
Closure / expensive / mega hostels
Closure / expensive / mega hostels
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Cane Toad
Re:YHA closures
I have been a YHA member on and off since I was 16 - I'm in my mid-forties now. The YHA seems to have gone well and truly off the rails with its top-heavy bureaucratic management style (which has to be financed) and its over-the-top writing style in its various publications. Its core market of walkers and cyclists has, I think, becoming increasingly alienated. I could go on for ever.
Why are they so set on providing en suites as "luxuries". These are fine in a family situation but when you're sharing with strangers ("new friends" in YHA-speak) they don't jolly well work. As soon as someone gets in the shower the toilet is no longer available. The issues of having the toilet attached to the dorm are manifold - smells, noises, discomfort at the utter closeness. Give me a good old-fashioned shower and toilet block any day! I've met a few people now who don't like en suites, yet the YHA pushes them as luxuries. I don't want luxury in a hostel anyway. I want somewhere CHEAP and CLEAN within reach of OTHER HOSTELS where I can spend the night.
I tried to book at Sheringham during this summer holiday and was told by the warden that it was closed for the entire six weeks of the summer holiday as it was catering for underprivileged children under some government-funded scheme. I have no problem with this concept (and think it is laudable) but the YHA should not be closing a whole hostel to card-carrying members for the whole of the busiest period of the year. Obviously YHA needs the money and that has to take precedence over members' needs. There was nothing about this in the handbook (even though the warden said they did it last year too) and nothing on the website. I went camping instead.
The YHA goes on about how the market has changed but maybe they have never really looked into WHY so many people have turned their backs on youth hostels - high prices and gaps in the network spring to mind.
Why are they so set on providing en suites as "luxuries". These are fine in a family situation but when you're sharing with strangers ("new friends" in YHA-speak) they don't jolly well work. As soon as someone gets in the shower the toilet is no longer available. The issues of having the toilet attached to the dorm are manifold - smells, noises, discomfort at the utter closeness. Give me a good old-fashioned shower and toilet block any day! I've met a few people now who don't like en suites, yet the YHA pushes them as luxuries. I don't want luxury in a hostel anyway. I want somewhere CHEAP and CLEAN within reach of OTHER HOSTELS where I can spend the night.
I tried to book at Sheringham during this summer holiday and was told by the warden that it was closed for the entire six weeks of the summer holiday as it was catering for underprivileged children under some government-funded scheme. I have no problem with this concept (and think it is laudable) but the YHA should not be closing a whole hostel to card-carrying members for the whole of the busiest period of the year. Obviously YHA needs the money and that has to take precedence over members' needs. There was nothing about this in the handbook (even though the warden said they did it last year too) and nothing on the website. I went camping instead.
The YHA goes on about how the market has changed but maybe they have never really looked into WHY so many people have turned their backs on youth hostels - high prices and gaps in the network spring to mind.
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Mick F
Re:YHA closures
Couldn't agree more!
I used YHAs during my LEJOGLE in July and was rather depressed regarding the accommodation and facilities. Too many families, foreign students, en-suit accomm, holiday-makers, noise, high prices, full board, ....... the list was endless.
Give me cheap, basic, friendly, clean, like-minded people, (not in that particular order!), ... the way it used to be.
Foreign students and families and holiday-makers have their place, but not in YHA accommodation please.
I stayed in a Backpackers place in Pitlochry - wonderful! Basic and clean and cheap.
Mick F. Cornwall
I used YHAs during my LEJOGLE in July and was rather depressed regarding the accommodation and facilities. Too many families, foreign students, en-suit accomm, holiday-makers, noise, high prices, full board, ....... the list was endless.
Give me cheap, basic, friendly, clean, like-minded people, (not in that particular order!), ... the way it used to be.
Foreign students and families and holiday-makers have their place, but not in YHA accommodation please.
I stayed in a Backpackers place in Pitlochry - wonderful! Basic and clean and cheap.
Mick F. Cornwall
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The Vicar
Re:YHA closures
I've met a few people now who don't like en suites, yet the YHA pushes them as luxuries.
That is because it is an industry standard for all types of accomodation.
It is hard to avoid standardisation.
That is because it is an industry standard for all types of accomodation.
It is hard to avoid standardisation.
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Cane Toad
Re:YHA closures
Further to my last posting, I have delved a bit deeper into the YHA's website and have discovered that Sheringham was hosting Do It 4 Real courses (children's summer camps not just for the underprivileged, "with support from the Big Lottery Fund") for the entire duration of the summer holidays (23rd July to 2nd September). There is nothing about this under the hostel entry (which is where most people would look). You have to dig around a bit.
But it wasn't only Sheringham. The YHA held these courses at 34 locations in England and Wales, most of which were at hostels, as follows: Castle Head, Coniston, Edale, Grinton Lodge, Hawkshead, Haworth, Langdale, Manchester, Osmotherly, Patterdale, Stainforth, Wastwater, Beaumanor, Castleton, Coalbrookdale, Coalport, Gradbach Mill, Howells, Ilam Hall, Llangollen, Ravenstor, Wilderhope, Calshot, Croft Farm, Exeter, Exford, Hampstead Heath, Holmbury, Ivinghoe, Okehampton, Quantock Lodge, River Dart, Sheringham, Truleigh Hill.
I phoned the YHA and asked if the hostels are effectively being taken out of the network for card carrying members at the busiest time of the year, and she admitted that they are, then jumped on the "Oh, but we do it for the children" and child protection bandwagons. I didn't join YHA all those years ago to find myself locked out of hostels so that the YHA can make money by snaring lottery cash to prop up its heaving bureaucracy. I'm all for giving underprivileged children breaks, but the hostels shouldn't be closed to bona fide members for the entire duration of the summer holidays. With the closures and impending closures, and now this, I wonder how big the network will be for walkers and cyclists next summer?
But it wasn't only Sheringham. The YHA held these courses at 34 locations in England and Wales, most of which were at hostels, as follows: Castle Head, Coniston, Edale, Grinton Lodge, Hawkshead, Haworth, Langdale, Manchester, Osmotherly, Patterdale, Stainforth, Wastwater, Beaumanor, Castleton, Coalbrookdale, Coalport, Gradbach Mill, Howells, Ilam Hall, Llangollen, Ravenstor, Wilderhope, Calshot, Croft Farm, Exeter, Exford, Hampstead Heath, Holmbury, Ivinghoe, Okehampton, Quantock Lodge, River Dart, Sheringham, Truleigh Hill.
I phoned the YHA and asked if the hostels are effectively being taken out of the network for card carrying members at the busiest time of the year, and she admitted that they are, then jumped on the "Oh, but we do it for the children" and child protection bandwagons. I didn't join YHA all those years ago to find myself locked out of hostels so that the YHA can make money by snaring lottery cash to prop up its heaving bureaucracy. I'm all for giving underprivileged children breaks, but the hostels shouldn't be closed to bona fide members for the entire duration of the summer holidays. With the closures and impending closures, and now this, I wonder how big the network will be for walkers and cyclists next summer?
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Mick F
Re:YHA closures
Well done, Cane Toad.
I was very upset, trying to arrange accomm up and down LEJOGLE for June, and I was booking back in early April. I was told it was they were full of schools ans foreign students getting in their outward bound stuff prior to the summer hols. I had to let my plans slip to July.
This is not the way it used to be. Once, one could just 'turn up' and get in. Now, one has to book well in advance.
Maybe there aren't enough hostels, or there's too many customers, or there's not the right kind of accommodation available for the right kind of people.
Mick F. Cornwall
I was very upset, trying to arrange accomm up and down LEJOGLE for June, and I was booking back in early April. I was told it was they were full of schools ans foreign students getting in their outward bound stuff prior to the summer hols. I had to let my plans slip to July.
This is not the way it used to be. Once, one could just 'turn up' and get in. Now, one has to book well in advance.
Maybe there aren't enough hostels, or there's too many customers, or there's not the right kind of accommodation available for the right kind of people.
Mick F. Cornwall
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Cane Toad
Re:YHA closures
There must surely be some entrepreneurs out there who would be able to build up small networks of private hostels (cheap, clean and basic) within cycling or walking distance of each other. There is a gap in the market!
There are of course some independent hostels of sorts (www.independenthostelguide.co.uk) but they don't seem to have taken off here in the same way that they have in Ireland, New Zealand and Australia, for example.
There are of course some independent hostels of sorts (www.independenthostelguide.co.uk) but they don't seem to have taken off here in the same way that they have in Ireland, New Zealand and Australia, for example.
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jb
Re:YHA closures
20 bed spaces at £10 a night – if you work on 40% capacity through he year that’s £80 a night, take out bank loan, servicing, building maintenance and rates – not a lot left.
Most private hostels are either an add on to an existing business (pub, farm, etc) or built with a specific target in mind (student field centre) or shored up with grants from some where.
Either way you don’t make your fortune running a hostel purely for itself. If it becomes a popular spot then why not turn it into a hotel – serve a fraction of the custom for five times the price.
That’s why youth hostels were in a unique position of having been given the buildings, a charity and not being profit led. If they don’t keep up their basic service to members the point of there existence will come to an end. And they will be just another outward-bound type centre of not much use to the public in general.
Most private hostels are either an add on to an existing business (pub, farm, etc) or built with a specific target in mind (student field centre) or shored up with grants from some where.
Either way you don’t make your fortune running a hostel purely for itself. If it becomes a popular spot then why not turn it into a hotel – serve a fraction of the custom for five times the price.
That’s why youth hostels were in a unique position of having been given the buildings, a charity and not being profit led. If they don’t keep up their basic service to members the point of there existence will come to an end. And they will be just another outward-bound type centre of not much use to the public in general.
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Bruce
Re:YHA closures
There was reference further back to Scottish hostels. Some don't even know they are Scottish. On Hoy in the Orkneys a notice near one hostel tells us it is run by the YHA. Really?