Overtourism

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Overcrowding by tourists in front of the " Mona Lisa " in the Louvre , example of "overcrowding"

As About tourism or Over Tourism development in is tourism refers to the emergence of openly appearing conflict has between locals and visitors to the most popular destinations to the object. From the point of view of the locals, tourists are becoming a disruptive factor that is increasingly burdening daily local life. The visitors themselves can also find the high number of tourists around them disturbing.

In the Oxford Dictionary , the word "overtourism" was a top 10 nominee for Word of the Year 2018.

The term “ overcrowding ” is related , which describes the overcrowding of heavily visited tourist destinations (destinations); "Overtourism" is also known as an increase in mass tourism .

Problem

Growing tourism leads to increasing conflicts in view of the limited space, they occur above all in the much-visited destinations , also known as “hotspots”, worldwide. The problem of growing tourism has so far been viewed primarily from the point of view of ecological and socio-cultural sustainability. In the 1980s, Mohamed A. Tangi of the United Nations Environment Program recommended rules for the friendly coexistence and coexistence of guests and locals, for example a maximum of 600 guests per hectare of beach. The more recent term overtourism also includes the psychological and political dimensions of the problem.

The consulting firm McKinsey published a study on overcrowding on behalf of the World Travel & Tourism Council in December 2017 . Among other things, it contains an evaluation matrix that should allow an assessment of where and to what extent the tourist crowds have become a problem. One of the criteria is the number of visitor density: from 930,000 people per square kilometer and year, according to the study, there is the greatest need for action, the crowd for residents and visitors would then be unreasonable, and infrastructure, sights and nature would also be overly strained.

Driving elements

Tourism is growing faster than the economy as a whole. The problem of overtourism has worsened in recent years due to the following developments:

  • Airbnb : The commercial apartment rental portal is misappropriating capacities that originally served the domestic housing market for tourist overnight stays. The result is usually an increase in apartment rents due to increased demand and the partial vacancy rate as well as a change in the social structure of cities, city districts or residential areas that are in demand.
  • Low-cost airlines : Due to the low-cost airlines' low tariffs, the travel distance only plays a subordinate role as a cost factor in travel planning.
  • Film tourism : Prominent buildings, villages, towns or landscapes can become a tourist hotspot if they have been used as a location for a film or a television series suddenly.
  • Cruises : Cruise tourism is growing rapidly. Ship sizes with 2000 and more passengers are common. Often several large ships are moored in a port of destination at the same time and offer guests shore excursions. Given the large number of tourists who suddenly appear, these places are often overwhelmed.

Examples

Amsterdam

In 2017, 18 million tourists visited Amsterdam - with around 800,000 inhabitants. In the March 2018 city council elections, overtourism was a campaign issue. A particular nuisance are “party tourists” who make noise and leave rubbish behind. The newly elected city council is planning various measures so that tourism does not develop even more at the expense of the locals. Among other things, the originally planned expansion of the port for cruise ships is being reconsidered.

After a municipal popular initiative received around 25,000 signatures in mid-June 2020 , the city parliament has to deal with the corresponding demands: e.g. that the number of tourist overnight stays should be limited from 20 to 12 million per year and the renting of apartments via Airbnb , for example , should also be prohibited the opening of new hotels. In addition, the tourist tax is to be increased significantly, the red light district is to be redesigned and drugs can no longer be sold to tourists in coffee shops.

Barcelona

According to media reports, the number of tourists in Barcelona has reached a critical level. In the summer of 2017, neighborhood associations organized a demonstration against the “touristification” on the popular city beach “Barceloneta” and thus caused a lot of media coverage. The mayoress of Barcelona, Ada Colau , issued the slogan: "Give the city back to the citizens." In concrete terms, this means: rents must be bearable, tourist crowds must not dominate the everyday life of individual districts.

Berlin

After Berlin came in 2017 nearly 13 million visitors. Young tourists in particular like to travel to Berlin to experience city life at night in the hip neighborhoods. Residents complain to the Berlin Senate about "party tourism" because of noise pollution, rubbish and crowding through holiday apartments. In the Warschauer Brücke area , for example , there is often "over-use", the existing infrastructure being overwhelmed.

Dubrovnik

In Dubrovnik , the flow of visitors is concentrated in the old town, which measures 400 by 300 meters. In 2016 there were four grocery stores in the old town of Dubrovnik, but 107 souvenir shops and 143 restaurants. Only around 1000 locals lived in the old town in 2018, some houses were sold to wealthy Russians and Arabs. Another burden are day guests of up to seven cruise ships at the same time . Only a small part of the income from tourism goes to local businesses. Residents exert political pressure with the motto: "We have to give the city back to its inhabitants."

Hallstatt

The small market town of Hallstatt in the Salzkammergut recorded a rush of 19,344 coaches or around one million visitors with 776 residents in 2018. Above all Asian, especially Chinese, tourists visit the place mostly as day tourists as part of Europe trips. The residents complain that their privacy is massively disturbed, so it is impossible to use terraces, especially since individual tourists even enter gardens or living rooms and even funeral ceremonies in the cemetery cannot be carried out in peace. It is photographed and it happens that spectators applaud after the funeral march. The community's income from public toilets exceeds property taxes at € 150,000. The community is intensively looking for solutions that will make life bearable for the residents again. From autumn 2020, coaches will only be allowed to drive in and allow their groups to disembark in time slots that have been allocated in advance by the local tourist office for a fee and are only offered to a limited extent and distributed throughout the day.

Iceland

In 2017 the number of tourists to Iceland was 2.5 million, seven years earlier it was only 0.5 million. In the summer months, every fifth person in the country is a tourist. With around 340,000 inhabitants, the rush of visitors causes an increase in prices for accommodation, food and other services. It is feared that the resource that most foreign visitors come for will be ruined - solitude, tranquility and spectacular unspoiled nature. In order to avoid that the population begins to perceive the tourists as a nuisance, the local authority plans to curb the increase in visitor numbers through various measures. In particular, the private rental of accommodation is to be more strictly regulated.

Palma de Mallorca

In the summer of 2017, up to seven large cruise ships were sometimes in the port of Palma de Mallorca in one day . With an increase of 10%, the number of holidaymakers on the island reached a record level in 2017. In the summer of 2017 there were demonstrations by the locals against the excesses of mass tourism. Overpriced apartments, pollution, overcrowded beaches and drinking water shortages were denounced.

Venice

Tourists on the Riva degli Schiavoni , Venice

Over 22 million visitors come to Venice every year . In 1951, 175,000 people lived in the city center; in 2018 there were only 55,000. Tourism with all its effects has displaced many residents. Large cruise ships are a particular source of conflict; the ship movements threaten the sensitive foundations of the buildings. Of the around 60,000 daily visitors to the city, half are cruisers, who also hardly spend any money there. Resistance groups have formed among the residents who exert political pressure. Statement from one of the victims: “The problem is that these tourists think this is a kind of Disneyland . But you shouldn't forget that this is a living city. ”In addition to a local tax for overnight guests, from 2019 Venice will charge an entrance fee for tourists.

Not-to-go lists

As an alternative to the current travel literature with lists of the most beautiful destinations worldwide, there are now publications that list those destinations that are not recommended because of too high a number of tourists. "Fodor's", a well-known English-language publisher for travel literature, has published a list of where not to go in 2018. In addition to overtourism, other criteria such as: B. Safety, ecological pollution, overcrowding, etc. are taken into account. For example, the list contains B. the Taj Mahal , Galápagos , Myanmar , Mount Everest , Phang Nga Park (Thailand), the Great Wall of China with Beijing and Cuba . The US television broadcaster CNN has also drawn up a list of negative recommendations for 2018. In addition to Venice, Dubrovnik and Barcelona, ​​it includes Santorini (Greece), Bhutan , the Isle of Skye (Scotland), Machu Picchu (Peru), Cinque Terre (Italy), Galápagos, Antarctica , Mount Everest and the Taj Mahal.

Measures against overtourism

Strategic measures

McKinsey points out that longer-term strategic planning and the formulation of suitable goals are required in the affected destinations, especially taking into account the aspect of sustainability. Local tourism management is traditionally geared towards administrative tasks. In the past, there was often only a demand for volume growth, for example based on the number of overnight stays. The basis for creating a plan is a detailed analysis of the current situation and the definition of suitable measurement parameters for monitoring the achievement of goals.

In addition, systematic public relations work must be carried out on site. Objectives, measures, successes and failures of local tourism management must be made transparent to the residents so that all relevant institutions are involved in the process.

In September 2018 the world tourism organization UNWTO met and published strategies with specific measures against overtourism:

  • Divide guests geographically better
  • Better distribute the length of stay in time
  • Promote unfamiliar guest routes and attractions
  • Review and use regulations, including restrictions
  • Further improve guest segmentation
  • Ensure local tourist benefits, in particular through skilled jobs and the participation of locals in tourism development
  • Offering infrastructures with experience qualities for guests and the population
  • Further improve public infrastructures, especially in transport
  • Take local interest groups seriously and involve them
  • Informing guests and sensitizing them to local rules and values
  • Use control and exchange mechanisms based on secured data and using new technologies

Operational measures

The organization Responsible Tourism , a department of the International Center for Responsible Tourism , has published a list of possible measures against overtourism as part of its advisory work. Concrete examples are:

  • Allocation : In the case of cruise ships, a restriction can be achieved by means of the docking permit issued by the port authority. It is more difficult to limit the number of non-cruise tourists. In the case of Dubrovnik, in order to protect the old town, UNESCO recommended that it should only visit a maximum of 8,000 visitors a day in order not to endanger its status as a World Heritage Site. In 2017, the newly elected mayor declared that he wanted to reduce the number to 4,000 per day. Since then, the streams of visitors have been counted at the city gates. It is not known to what extent the measure works in practice. The Uffizi Gallery in Florence regularly attracts a large number of visitors. In order to regulate the rush, the administration has set up the possibility of online reservations in advance. You will receive a message stating a date and time for access. This allows you to go straight to the entrance past the usual queue. The Miniatur Wunderland in Hamburg has been using such a system for several years.
  • Prices, fees and taxes : starting points are, for example, port fees for cruise ships or overnight fees for hotels. The City of Berlin has been charging a fee of 5% of the room rate since 2014. It is not known to what extent this measure also has a regulating effect in the Berlin case or is just a financing measure. In the case of Airbnb overnight stays, the press shows that the tax authorities are increasingly checking correct taxation. The lagoon city of Venice will charge an entrance fee from September 2019.
  • Bans : Venice has banned cruise ships over 40,000 GRT from entering the bay in front of St. Mark's Square . As an example, Berlin has imposed a ban on misappropriating living space to prevent Airbnb rentals. The mayor of Barcelona has imposed a moratorium on the construction of new hotels.

Self-restraint

In the case of Venice, some cruise lines ( P&O Cruises , Holland-America , Cunard ) have already reduced the number of annual visits.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Ko Koens, Albert Postma, Bernadett Papp: Is Over Tourism Overused? Understanding the Impact of Tourism in a City Context . In: Sustainability . tape 10 , no. 12 , 23 November 2018, ISSN  2071-1050 , p. 4384 , doi : 10.3390 / su10124384 ( mdpi.com [accessed February 25, 2019]).
  2. ↑ Word of the Year 2018 is… . In: Oxford Dictionary . Accessed in 2019-044-15.
  3. ↑ Korinna kurz: Why locals suffer from too many tourists - and what you can do. In: bento. April 2, 2019, accessed July 10, 2018 .
  4. ^ Furthermore, Müller, Zolles: Marketing practice in tourism , ORAC Verlag, 1989 and later editions, ISBN 3-7015-0182-3 . In "Leisure and Tourism" (Hoffmann, 1981)
  5. ^ Furthermore, Müller, Zolles: Marketing practice in tourism , ORAC Verlag, 1989 and later editions, ISBN 3-7015-0182-3 . In "Leisure and Tourism" (Hoffmann, 1981)
  6. ↑ Dr Hugues Seraphin & Dr Paul Sheeran & Dr Manuela Pilato: Over-tourism and the fall of Venice as a destination ( EN ) In: Journal of Destination Marketing & Management . February 22, 2018. Retrieved May 8, 2018.
  7. ↑ Over Tourism: Fact, Fiction or Food for Thought . In: ITB Berlin Exhibition Center . Retrieved May 8, 2018.
  8. ↑ Tanja Klindworth: Overtourism - The tip of the travel iceberg . In: www.spaness.de . Retrieved May 23, 2018.
  9. ↑ Timo Kotowski: When vacationers get annoying . In: faz.net . March 18, 2018. Retrieved May 8, 2018.
  10. ↑ Eva Dignös: Where vacationers are no longer so welcome . In: Süddeutsche Zeitung . December 5, 2019. Retrieved August 29, 2020.
  11. ^ A b c Gloria Guevara Manzo, Margaux Constantin and others: Coping with success: Managing overcrowding in tourism destinations ( EN ) In: McKinsey & Company . December 2017. Retrieved May 23, 2018.
  12. ↑ a b c Ute Müller: Now comes the upper limit for tourists . In: welt.de . December 27, 2017. Retrieved May 23, 2018.
  13. ↑ Sandra Louven: The unbridled tourism boom must be limited . In: handelsblatt.de . April 15, 2019. Retrieved April 15, 2019.
  14. ↑ Joshua Kocher, Daniel Laufer: Not even the city knows how many Airbnb apartments there are in Freiburg . In: Badische Zeitung . 19th June 2020.
  15. ↑ Badische-zeitung.de August 4, 2018, Johanna Renoth ( dpa ): Berlin, Munich, Paris & Co. declare war on Airbnb (June 19, 2020)
  16. ↑ Lutz Heyser: New record expected on the oceans . In: SWR . June 6, 2017. Retrieved May 9, 2018.
  17. ↑ a b dpa: A city no longer wants to be an amusement park . In: Badische-zeitung.de . June 18, 2020.
  18. ↑ Amsterdam wants to curb tourism . In: stern . May 18, 2018. Retrieved May 18, 2018.
  19. ↑ Thomas Urban : Barcelona goes against mass tourism . In: www.sueddeutsche.de . March 13, 2018. Retrieved June 20, 2018.
  20. ↑ a b c d e Overtourism: Where should the journey go? . In: DW Deutsche Welle . March 7, 2018. Retrieved May 8, 2018.
  21. ↑ Thomas Lindemann: Too many tourists: The Berliners have had enough . In: FAZ.NET . ISSN  0174-4909 ( faz.net [accessed December 2, 2018]).
  22. ↑ a b c Mašenjka Bačić: The dark side of tourism: residents of Dubrovnik see on TV whether they can get out . In: euronews . August 22, 2017. Retrieved May 10, 2018.
  23. ↑ a b c d Hubert Beyerle: Tourists come, Croats go . In: Barbara Bauer, Dorothee d'Aprile (ed.): Le Monde diplomatique . No. 06/24 . TAZ / WOZ , June 2018, ISSN  1434-2561 , p. 10 .
  24. ↑ Mariele Schulze Berndt: Hallstatt would be so beautiful - if it weren't for the tourists . In: Augsburger Allgemeine . Retrieved March 13, 2019.
  25. ↑ Hasnain Kazim: Village in Austria: Why so many Chinese come to Hallstatt . In: Spiegel Online . October 20, 2018 ( spiegel.de [accessed May 28, 2019]).
  26. ↑ Hallstatt limits tourist buses. January 29, 2019, accessed May 28, 2019 .
  27. ↑ How Hallstatt defends itself against the flood of Chinese tourists . In: nzz-online . 23 August 2019.
  28. ↑ How many vacationers can Iceland take? Annoyance on the island increases . In: welt.de . November 4, 2017. Retrieved May 22, 2018.
  29. ↑ Rudolf Hermann: The number of tourists on Iceland is exploding - will the island cope with that? . In: Neue Zürcher Zeitung . November 29, 2017. Retrieved May 18, 2018.
  30. ↑ Simon Osborne: Don't look now, Venice tourists - the locals are sick of you ( EN ) In: The Guardian . September 27, 2016. Retrieved May 10, 2018.
  31. ↑ Overtourism and safety cited in Fodor's 'where not to go' list ( EN ) In: ctvnews . December 27, 2017. Retrieved May 8, 2018.
  32. ↑ Joe Minihane: 12 destinations travelers might want to avoid in 2018 ( en-US ) In: CNN . February 3, 2018. Retrieved May 8, 2018.
  33. ↑ Peter Grunder: Correctly regulating the flows , GastroJournal, Zurich October 11, 2018, p. 7.
  34. ^ Website of the ICRT . Retrieved May 23, 2018.
  35. ↑ Over Tourism - Can we have too many tourists? . In: Responsible Tourism . Retrieved May 23, 2018.
  36. ↑ Dubrovnik plans drastic tourist limits, and curbs on cruise ships, to save World Heritage status . In: The Telegraph . ( telegraph.co.uk [accessed June 26, 2018]).
  37. ↑ Contributo di accesso a Venezia: tutte le informazioni utili ( it ) In: Città di Venezia . April 2, 2019. Retrieved April 18, 2019.
  38. ↑ Prohibition of misappropriation of living space . In: Senate Department Berlin . Retrieved May 10, 2018.