Peak tourism, peak anger: sustainable solutions needed

The last full week in August marks the peak in the #tourist season in many Western country resort #cities. Perceptions of over-tourism has led to protests, highlighting the need for #sustainable solutions.

This year is likely to see another record in tourism volumes across Europe, thanks to hot weather and a holidaymakers’ continuing desire to take advantages of travel opportunities closed off during the Covid-19 pandemic. More than 85 million tourists visited Spain, a prime destination, last year - a record that surpassed the previous peak in 2019.

The mass influx led to a flurry of mostly peaceful albeit noisy protests by native residents angry at overcrowding, higher prices, and fears that the growth in the number of homes being used as holiday stays was depriving locals of affordable housing and public services such as sewage, Mallorca, Malaga and the Canary Islands saw organised protests while residents in Barcelona sprayed dining tourists with water pistols to get their message across.

But these activities have not prompted an early, guilty flight home now will deter next years holidaymakers, who see a summer vacation as a right. Even official efforts to deter tourists have failed: Amsterdam’s attempt to put off “stag-do” Brits had little impact. Time will tell if Barcelona’s plan to scrap the licences of some 10,100 flats currently approved as short-term rentals benefits its citizens.

As students of urban sustainability know, a sustainable city rests on three pillars of social, economic and environmental benefits. As often happens, so-called over-tourism manifests as a victory of economic interests over those of a city’s environmental and social qualities.

Rather than one-off measures that may only have a minor or temporary effect, may even just displace the problem elsewhere, and could impose an economic cost on the local tourism industry, making tourism more sustainable will require a coordinated approach that strikes a balance between the three pillars.

Identify impacts, deliver gains

The first step is to get a full picture of the impacts rather than relying in an edit Al evidence. A survey of almost 225 destinations across all 27 EU states found the four strongest impacts were: the increased cost of housing and living; environmental degradation and congestion; economic problems during the low season; and irregular and precarious work.

The next step identifies the factors that makes destinations more resilient. The ones with most potential revolved around strategies to conserve natural features, create more effective destination management, and improve quality of local services and facilities.

As part of a two-year initiative that runs until December 2025, the Commission will identify what it sees as the key challenges to, and best practices for delivering sustainable and resilient tourism. It will then set up a “peer-to-peer twinning mechanism” for tourism destinations facing similar challenges, which will enable cities to share experiences, learn from each other, and collaborate on achieving common objectives. Finally it will communicate lessons learned to destination management organisations and tourists.

There are some signs of an impact. Two-thirds of destinations are already implementing measures to improve their tourism industry’s sustainability and resilience. These mainly address the environmental concerns, but others look sociocultural and economic aspects.

At a micro level measures are likely to include making tourism smarter, using digital technology to help tourists find alternative activities to spread the impact, and more sustainable tourism activities and transport. As with a holiday, the journey is an important as the destination.