Unique church visitor scheme listed for tourism board award

Heritage Inspired is funded by the National Lottery and for the last few years has worked with churches and other "faith buildings" to help them open up to tourism potential.

Each year, workers organise a Heritage Festival, which involves what organisers call "heritage faith sites" across the county opening their doors and organising events.

Recent figures show the festivals, which also include guided coach trips to some of South Yorkshire's most stunning, but least-visited churches, attract 25,000 visitors each year.

Tourism board Welcome to Yorkshire has now recognised the hard work put in by shortlisting the festival in its Best Tourism Experience category in the annual White Rose Awards.

The project manager of Heritage Inspired, Sarah Arthur, said: "We are still unique – the only heritage faith tourism initiative in the UK. We work with sites all over South Yorkshire and now some areas of West Yorkshire.

"We currently have over 150 partner sites, of all faiths and denominations. We work with them to develop their interpretation, publicity and visitor welcome and we organise events.

"South Yorkshire has wonderful heritage of faith buildings. Our aim is to get them open for visitors."

White Rose Award winners will be announced at a ceremony to be held by Welcome to Yorkshire in Harrogate on October 4.

Chief executive Gary Verity said: "The Yorkshire tourism industry has really stepped up its game in terms of quality and presence."