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Kent tourist hotspots including Tunbridge Wells, Canterbury, and Faversham, see footfall decline over the past year

Some of the most popular parts of Kent have seen a decline in tourism over the past year.

Data for June this year has been released by Visit Kent, looking at the monthly footfall through visitor information centres, as well as admission numbers for the county's attractions.

The statistics show that most areas experienced a decline in interest of around 10%, but some others saw their numbers plummet by more than 20%.

The Pantiles in Tunbridge Wells. Stock Picture.
The Pantiles in Tunbridge Wells. Stock Picture.

The hardest hit area was Tunbridge Wells, which saw almost 1,000 fewer people using its information centre this June than in June 2015.

This may not sound like many people, but in fact, it represents a 31.7% reduction compared to last year's figure.

This is in contrast to the 3.3% increase between June 2014 and 2015.

Another surprising statistic from the survey was that tourist numbers for Faversham went down by a fifth.

The town is home to the Shepherd Neame brewery, which is a firm favourite with visitors to Kent.

Canterbury also saw a decline, with its number decreasing by more than 1,500 people.

Half of the visitors to the cathedral city were European, with many European schools choosing Canterbury as a destination for trips.

Speculative reasons for the fall in numbers around Kent include fears following terror attacks elsewhere in Europe, and poor weather.

In contrast to these areas, which have traditionally been hotspots for tourists, more urban areas saw an increase in visitor numbers.

Medway saw a 25.6% boost, with almost 5,000 more people visiting the area in June this year than last year.

Home of the Chatham Historic Dockyard and landmarks such as Rochester Cathedral, this is the biggest increase from the survey.

Maidstone has seen an increase of 5.6%, with more than 5,000 people visiting the county town's information centre in June.

With figures from all areas taken into account, there has in fact been a 0.8% increase in visitors to the county's information centres.

This contrasts visitors numbers for Kent's attractions, which fell by almost 35,000 people.

Three quarters of county-wide visitors were from the UK, with almost 20% being from Europe.

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