User:Kku/Overtourism

Overtourism describes destinations where hosts/locals or guests/visitors feel that the quality of life in the area or the quality of the touristic experience has deteriorated unacceptably. Often both locals and visitors experience this deterioration concurrently. The term is commonly used to describe situations where people feel there are ‘too many tourists’, or where the impact of tourist development is negatively affecting local lives without providing enough benefits in return. The opposing term to overtourism would be sustainable tourism, in a sense that it’s focused on using tourism to make better places to live in and better places to visit.

Origin
Over the past decade travel has become increasingly easier thanks to the widespread use of the internet (leading to the fast dissemination of travel-related information and allowing the growth of low-cost airlines, P2P rental platforms, etc.) and it has also become more affordable thanks to low oil prices and more efficient means of transport (driving down overall transportation costs). This global surge in tourism has also been fuelled by the growing middle class in emerging countries who is now beginning to do vacations abroad. As peoples’ living standards rise, they tend to spend more in travel and tourism, and this has an obvious impact in the world’s most popular destinations.

As tourism continues to grow steadily, overtourism is becoming a critical issue in the travel industry. The term is becoming commonplace in a sector that until now has boasted a seemingly endless appetite for growth in tourist arrivals figures.

Increasingly residents are raising this issue and as a result it’s moving up in the political agenda. What can be done to manage tourism so that it does not overwhelm the destinations where the presence of tourists is beginning to be seen as a problem?

As local politicians suffer pressure from both voters and industry lobbyists, it’s becoming increasingly important to objectively define what’s a ‘reasonable’ number of visitors and what can be done to avoid or minimize this emerging phenomenon without neglecting the importance of tourism in the development of local economies.

Problems
Some of the issues communities are faced with when attempting to accommodate an overflow of visitors are common to all tourist destinations. Usually the existing infrastructure just can’t handle the amount of people who come during certain times of the year, and this puts a strain on the natural environment, infrastructures and public services. Congested roads and pedestrian pathways, lack of public toilets, overwhelmed health services and security forces, noise pollution, water pollution, etc., all these factors contribute to a situation where residents starts seeing tourists as a nuisance, resulting in them being ill-treated by the local population. The influx of visitors also creates seasonal effects in employment levels and considerable price fluctuations, as well as a long-term effect in housing and commercial prices that can result in a real estate bubble and subsequent economic crisis. There are also other intangible effects such as a perceived or real change in local culture derived from the constant contact with foreign habits and cultures, which is sometimes seen as a positive influence but also as a potential cause for loss of genuineness and cultural identity.

Solutions
Although it’s impossible to apply a one-size-fits-all approach to such complex issues, there are numerous measures that can be implemented in order to promote a more sustainable and inclusive economic growth based on tourism. Many destinations are employing a variety of different strategies to limit the number of tourists while trying to maximize the economic opportunities that arise from tourism. Some of these measures more reactive than prescriptive, and not all of them achieve an outcome that improves the experience for both tourists, residents, local businesses and the environment. Here are some examples of such measures:
 * Regulating, limiting or banning sharing economy providers such as Airbnb, Uber, etc.;
 * Limiting or capping the number of allowed visitors into certain areas or touristic sites considered to be particularly fragile or sensitive (in places such as Cinque Terre, Italy or in Fernando de Noronha, Brazil, a daily fee is charged to tourists upon arrival;
 * Limiting the number of residents in certain areas (by setting limits and rules to the approval of new construction);
 * Limiting the number and type of businesses allowed to operate in certain areas, or banning and limiting certain activities in certain neighbourhoods
 * The strict enforcement of noise, littering, car parking and other already existing regulations (applying heavy fines to noisy bars, trash generated by visitors, etc.);
 * The study of a destination carrying capacity in order to ensure that infrastructures and services are correctly dimensioned to the expected volume of visitors;
 * Tourist mobility: facilitating tourist mobility by promoting public transports as a flexible and independent travel option, means you have to first analyse how user-friendly and integrated are your local train, bus and metro networks from a visitor point-of-view.