Tourism damage control

Welcome to Boston -- a city that's trying to keep the Big Dig from ruining your visit.

Boston has a narrowing window of time to make sure a fatal tunnel tragedy doesn't become a major deterrent to tourism and convention business, travel industry executives say. For visitors, the closed tunnel means added costs, coming up with alternative transportation options, adjusting schedules, and avoiding certain parts of the city, said Wesley Harrington , executive director of the New England chapter of Meeting Professionals International, a group for corporate, association, and independent meeting planners.

People debating whether to book an event in Boston within the next 12 months might hold off until it becomes clear when the Big Dig woes will finally end. ``It's certainly a big deal in the short term to anyone who has an event coming into the city between now and the end of the year," Harrington said. ``Ultimately, I don't think Boston's reputation will be hurt long term as long as this doesn't mushroom into something much bigger. If it's anything more than a few months of road closures, then it could be trouble."

Already, the Massachusetts Convention Center Authority is doing damage control: spending thousands of dollars to bus conventioneers to Logan International Airport in an attempt to minimize what could be months of traffic snarls after last week's Big Dig tunnel ceiling collapse.

James E. Rooney , executive director of the authority, said he has reached out to most organizers of the 17 conferences coming to Boston in the next 90 days to answer any questions and address concerns. No one has canceled yet, Rooney said, and he's hoping to keep it that way.

``People in the industry, like local commuters, are looking for their confidence to be restored," said Rooney, whose agency oversees both the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center in South Boston and the John B. Hynes Veterans Memorial Convention Center in the Back Bay.

U ntil last week, Boston seemed to be on a roll. The city had successfully hosted a Democratic National Convention, opened a new state-of-the-art convention center, and could proudly say it was home to a world champion baseball team. Despite being billions over budget and years behind schedule, the Big Dig was widely hailed as an engineering marvel. In short, Boston had become a city that worked. But not anymore.

``For the Convention and Visitors Bureau, this story's a nightmare -- it's a horror show," said Charles Leocha , chief executive of the travel website Tripso.com. Leocha, who is based in East Boston but travels virtually every week and communicates all day with travel experts worldwide, said, ``The impact on Boston tourism at this moment is about zero, but outsiders aren't yet aware of how big a disaster this can be."

Organizers of ACM SIGGRAPH, a big computer-graphics trade show coming to the Boston Convention & Exhibition Center Aug. 1, have taken notice. The group took the step of adding a banner on its website that links directly to the latest traffic-disruption information available here, since rides from the airport can take up to an hour longer than normal.

``It's obviously a national story, so everybody's aware of it," said trade show spokesman Brian Ban.

Ban predicted conventioneers, who for the last two years have met in traffic-clogged Los Angeles, are likely to be forgiving of delays in Boston, to a point. ``Accidents happen, but the Big Dig doesn't have the best reputation, given how grossly over budget and behind schedule it is," Ban said. ``If it gets to the point where there's a repeat issue, then I think the city of Boston's really going to have some PR issues."

Jamie Horwitz, spokesman for the American Federation of Teachers, which began a 4,500-person convention at the South Boston center yesterday , said, ``It will be the first convention since 1916 that we've ever had a travel advisory for."

While the group is warning members that ``it's important we remain flexible" in handling traffic woes, Horwitz said, ``People know the city has some problems, but it doesn't take away from the greatness of the city."

Officials from the convention center and the public-private Greater Boston Convention and Visitors Bureau said they see no signs that Boston's national reputation -- which turns so heavily on history, the harbor, and the area's schools and hospitals -- is being seriously damaged.

Still, Rooney, the executive director of the convention authority, said he is working on the assumption the next three or four big events over the coming weeks will face major transportation headaches, and the authority will probably offer bus service for other conventions. Yesterday, it provided buses to the airport for some 2,000 people attending the Cable & Telecommunications Association for Marketing summit, and it plans to do the same for the teachers event ending Sunday.

``Other conferences are watching how well things go, so we need to make sure they go well. So spending a couple of thousand dollars on these buses is a good investment," Rooney said. ``These are the people who are going to go back and answer the questions about what happened."

Added Larry Meehan , vice president of the visitors bureau: ``We're getting, from time to time, the individuals calling in saying, `I heard all the tunnels in Boston are closed!' The most important thing for us to do is, as we have been, get the word out that the city is open, but we're all going to have to be a little more patient."

Peter J. Howe can be reached athowe@globe.com. Jenn Abelsoncan be reached atabelson@globe.com.