The temptation of Venice

What do Amsterdam, Mount Fuji or Venice have in common? All these tourist spots have just taken measures to regulate tourism. The Amsterdam town hall has just banned the construction of new hotels, day visitors must pay five euros to discover St. Mark’s Square and climbing the highest Japanese peak now costs twelve euros.

In the Canaries, the population, exasperated by the rise in real estate prices, is demonstrating against this mass tourism. Some activists even went on hunger strike. Sports tourism does not escape criticism: Mont Blanc, for example, is far too busy, symbol of spots where sports tourists concentrate with its corollary, conflicts of use and degradation of natural spaces.

To avoid sawing the branch we find ourselves on, let’s rethink tourism marketing to encourage those who can to take advantage of remarkable spots out of season and thus free up space for others, who are less flexible. We must undoubtedly also promote “dupe” destinations, those which suffer from under-tourism but which have many similarities with their bulky big sisters. It is often enough to just take a step aside to discover them.

Failing to do so, all these overcrowded sites will have little other than the solution of imposing quotas or, worse, having the temptation to imitate Venice: selection by money.