Welcome to the Vacationer Web site !

Importance of vacationers

Gatineau Valley vacationers spend close to $11 million annually on food products, excluding restaurant expenses. Close to 65% of that amount, i.e., slightly more than $7 million, is spent in Gatineau Valley businesses!

The Gatineau Valley SADC (Société d’aide au développement des collectivités)
is launching the very first website intended for vacationers, and as such, is proud to roll out its new creation which dovetails with its local development project dealing with vacationers.

This is the very first public interest website aimed directly andspecifically at vacationers on its territory.

Already a forerunner in this field, the GatineauValley SADC is hoping to offervacationers on the Gatineau Valley territory a means to help them organize their activities on any one of the numerous waterways in the region.

This website will bring about better synergy between vacationers, the local population and the business community. At the end of the project, the www.villegiateur.com website will become a communications hub providing sections on general interest topics, vacationers associations, businesses, public services, tourists, and municipalities and two interactive sections enabling vacationers in the community to correspond with one another: a discussion forum (blog) and a bulletin board.

 The outcome of extensive consultation

The Gatineau Valley SADC was first in Québec to take an active interest in vacationers as an economic phenomenon. As far back as 2005,
it conducted two studies to define and quantify the phenomenon and evaluate the annual economic repercussions.

These studies laid the groundwork for the actions taken. This website was one of the needs directly expressed by vacationers at discussion group meetings held in 2005. Several other actions were taken as a result of these two studies: the Vacationer's Symposium in February 2007, the production of a business handbook for vacationers early in the 2006 season, animation activities in 2006 and 2007, and participation in the Cottage and Home Builder’s Show in Ottawa in 2006, to name a few.

The www.villegiateur.com website is fully bilingual and will offer content that is both lively and interactive from one season to the next.

The Gatineau Valley SADC will thus be paying attention and adjusting to the vacationers' information needs by following the latest “hot” topics such as the Gatineau Valley Lakes Federation Forum on the Environment in September 2007 or the case surrounding the Integrated Resources Management Plan of the SAGE (Société d’aménagement et de gestion des lacs Trente-et-un-milles et Pémichangan) which describes the resources in both lakes, a management methods hypothesis and multi-resource development strategies.

The vacationers’ blog will also give users a chance to express various viewpoints. Vacationers associations will also be able to use it to contact our members, and the content will be updated regularly.

This is the means by which the Gatineau Valley SADC hopes to respond to a need first expressed by the some 6000 vacationers settled in the Gatineau Valley RCM. However, this project also addresses a communication- and cooperation-related need expressed at the 2007 symposium by those involved in the vacationer market, be they vacationers, members of the business community, municipal, school, community and other sectors, etc.

Thanks to Our 16111 Visitors
(Since March 2008)