Dutchess County Tourism partners with Metro-North By LYNN WOODS

Dutchess County Tourism partners with Metro-North
By LYNN WOODS

Mary Kay Vrba

Mary Kay Vrba, director of Dutchess County Tourism (DCT), spoke about some of the exciting initiatives of her office at the monthly breakfast of the Rhinebeck Chamber of Commerce April 25. The meeting was held in the Milan Road House, a charming relic from 1947 with cheery yellow walls, chrome stools and old movies silently airing on the TV.

Vrba said tourism is bringing in $447 million in revenues to the county, a $49 million increase from 2001. One initiative is making the area more accessible to people without cars, which would include international tourists coming to New York City (a particularly lucrative market; Vrba noted that international travelers spend two-and-a-half times more than domestic tourists). Using the proceeds from a $50,000 state grant, DCT is promoting a series of tours from June to October in conjunction with Metro-North Railroad. The tours will depart from train stations at Beacon, Poughkeepsie and Wassaic, visiting nearby farms, wineries and villages, and will be promoted in six-week blocks. Metro-North is printing 100,000 brochures. The program is a pilot project and Vrba expected it would take three years to get off the ground.

DCT is also producing an agricultural-tourism brochure for motorists that will highlight pick-your-own farms and other attractions and include itineraries and maps. Brochures for kayak and bike tours are also being printed. Speaking of bikes, a big upcoming event is the 90-mile bike ride from Manhattan to Poughkeepsie June 23. Pledges for the participants are being solicited, and Vrba said all proceeds from the ride will benefit the renovation of the Poughkeepsie/Highland Railroad Bridge, which is scheduled to be open in 2009 (in time for the quadri-centennial celebration of Henry Hudson’s discovery of the river).

In another pass at car-free travelers, DCT is working with the Dutchess County Fairgrounds to have an express bus pick up passengers from the Metro-North train station in Poughkeepsie and bring them to the fairgrounds. The bus would also stop in Rhinebeck.

Vrba encouraged local businesses to offer incentives to visitors to encourage them to come back. “Once we get folks up here, they’ll return again and again,” she said.

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