Tourism is absolutely crushing these places
The allure of becoming a destination city is a blessing and a curse.
Tourism is fun! You get to go to someplace you’ve either never been before – or likely don't see very often – and experience something different from your normal everyday life. But with the airline industry becoming more prominent over the last few decades, the rise of social media, and a generally wealthier world overall, some places have become crushed under a tidal wave of tourists. And while those same places often benefit economically, the people who live there can be subjected to some pretty awful nuisances. Let’s take a look at a few examples of over-tourism and what those places are doing to combat it.
Amsterdam, Netherlands
It probably comes as no surprise that the first example we’re going to run through is Amsterdam. The city has made a lot of news lately around the very subject of this article. And it’s true! Amsterdam is absolutely overwhelmed these days by tourists. According to an article by CNN, the amount of tourists Amsterdam receives per year is expected to grow from about 18 million (as of 2019) to 42 million by 2030. That would be 51 tourists for every one person actually living within the city. This meant that most of Amsterdam’s attractions were usually swamped by tourists.
One such attraction, the famous “Iamsterdam” sign was permanently removed from its location on the Museumplein in 2018 because it was becoming unmanageable. Likewise, Amsterdam’s famous “Red Light District” is increasingly being swarmed not by customers for the people who work there, but by tourists who use it as an opportunity to gawk. An unusual problem, but a problem nonetheless.
Where tourists mostly come from
Most of Amsterdam’s tourists come from within Europe. As of 2017, Germany led the pack with over 5 million tourists annually, followed by the Netherlands neighbor Belgium, and the United Kingdom bringing up the rear. Tourists from the UK, in particular, has become quite infamous in Amsterdam for their rowdy stag and hen parties. Of all groups, they seem to be the most disliked within Amsterdam. Outside of Europe, the United States brought about 1.4 million tourists in 2017 with China and Canada bringing in 340,000 and 180,000 respectively.
What they’re doing to stop over-tourism
While it’s very challenging to outright stop tourism, the city has taken a proactive approach in stopping places from being overwhelmed. In addition to removing the “Iamsterdam” sign, it has also put a stop to “Red Light District” tours. More recently, the city has taken to actively advertising people not to visit. In March of 2023, British men who used Google to search for “stag party Amsterdam” or “pub crawl Amsterdam” were shown ads illustrating the consequences of partying too hard in Amsterdam. We’ll have to see if this is able to quell some of the more problematic tourists to Amsterdam.
Bali, Indonesia
This one is particularly unique because it’s a relatively recent addition to the over-tourism club and an odd consequence of war in Ukraine. The island paradise has seen a crush of tourism since its borders reopened a year ago. Some notable bad behavior as reported by the Washington Post includes driving while drunk, flashing for social media photos (a big no-no for a staunchly Islamic country), and even having sex publicly on beaches native Balinese consider to be sacred.
Where tourists mostly come from
The number of tourists to Bali has averaged over 300,000 for the last few months. Which is far less than Amsterdam, but still an incredible lift for an island not accustom to so many. And while many of those tourists come from Australia, one newer nuisance tourist is coming from Russia. Since the war in Ukraine began, Russians haven’t exactly been welcomed with open arms in many places. Indonesia, and Bali have been one of the few that offer Russians visas on arrival. As such, more Russians than ever are flocking to the island. In January, 2023 over 20,000 Russians made it to the island, second only to Australia.
What they’re doing to stop over-tourism
As it turns out, while Australia doesn’t get a pass in this regard, the Russian tourists aer posing quite a problem for Bali. As such, the governor of the island has proposed revoking the visa on arrival program for Russia and Ukraine in order to stop bad behavior by both groups. Another Indonesian minister has proposed a tax on foreign visitors in order to scare off “lower income” visitors. And, like Amsterdam, Indonesia is also running ads for people searching for getaways to the island to behave more respectfully.
Hawaii, United States
No stranger to tourism, Hawaii is also facing a crush of tourists since the end of the pandemic. In truth it was suffering from over-tourism before as well, but things have really kicked off in a bad way. In 2018 Hawaii received about 11 million tourists, almost double what the string of islands got in 2000. This has caused a lot of problems for the natural areas surrounding the island. Not least because tourists seem to not be able to control themselves when a sea turtle happens to come on shore.
Where tourists mostly come from
It probably comes as no surprise but most of Hawaii’s tourists come from the continental United States with the western half supplying the most Americans overall. Japan came in second behind the United States. Overall, international tourists make up about 30% of all tourism to the islands.
What they’re doing to stop over-tourism
Hawaii is looking at multiple different ways to slow the tourism train down. The first is that the state is seriously considering shutting down its state tourism board, the Hawaii Tourism Authority. You’re probably familiar with this kind of board as they’re largely responsible for any ad from any state that tells you why you should visit Wyoming, California, Kentucky, and so on. But while stopping advertising might help a bit, at this point Hawaii is a known quantity, so other options are also being considered.
The Hawaiian state legislature has proposed a bill in the past to charge every visitor a $50 fee to visit the island. The money would be sent back to help conservation efforts around the state. Another effort by Maui specifically is attempting to put a cap on the number of tourists allowed to enter the island. Neither exist at the moment, but it goes to show the lengths to which Hawaiian politicians will go to slow down tourism.
More places are suffering too
These three, of course, were just examples. As COVID era restrictions have eased around the world, people have flocked to distant locations to satisfy their pent up demand for travel and sight seeing. Venice, Lisbon, Barcelona, Cambodia, Machu Picchu (Peru), U.S. national parks, and even places like Iceland are struggling to deal with our collective need to break from the norm. And while there’s no such thing as a single solution, I’d argue that if you do want to do some travel, maybe stick to something off the beaten path a bit. I hear Tasmania is nice!
At first I read Tanzania and not Tasmania at the end and was gonna be like, “well, the Serengeti would be an interesting analysis of overtourism as well.” But really, this is such a huge topic with so many places to discuss. Iceland became very trendy in the early-mid 2010s after the Great Recession, before which is was mostly an obscure and difficult place to visit. There’s also Japan which, like Hawaii, is a known quantity, but its tourism appeal has really grown in the past 10 years (also following a crisis, the 2011 earthquake). I didn’t know the extent of overtourism in Japan until I was in Tokyo in 2019 and dealt with the crushed humanity on Takeshita Street that in hindsight resembled the crowd trampling conditions that proved devastating in Itaewon in Seoul late last year. Some other interesting cases with regards to overtourism I think are Banff, Prague, the Great Barrier Reef, and San Francisco, in addition to the ones you mentioned at the end.