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Currently living in Barcelona, where 'overtourism' is a much bigger problem than in Norway IMHO, it feels weird. You start passing bills on restricting tourism,

Currently living in Barcelona, where 'overtourism' is a much bigger problem than in Norway IMHO, it feels weird. You start passing bills on restricting tourism, then the natural next step is being hard on immigration, then Brexit. The ability to control who goes in and who goes out usually falls on the hand of those that shouldn't have that kind of power. Edit: Removed "At the risk of being downvoted" as some comments suggested

bjornsing 7y ago
Yea it’s a funny word “overtourism”. I guess it’s what you call it when other people go on vacation (whereas when I go on vacation it’s just “tourism”). :P
- tonyedgecombe 7y ago
  Some of us aren’t convinced whether it’s us travelling or someone else.
- ohduran 7y ago
  If it's you, then it's a 'traveler' or a 'wonderlust'. The rest of the world are simply 'tourists'. It all comes down to the question "who do you think you are to block my path?" It's not a straightforward answer, though. We've been struggling to answer this as human beings since forever.
  - Scoundreller 7y ago
    Instead of the destination country finding a way to charge tourists more to discourage them, source countries could tax them more to resolve the issue and keep the monies for themselves.
  - jameshart 7y ago
    Indeed. This exact attitude was satirized in an A Bit of Fry & Laurie sketch waaaay back in 1990: Hugh: Ah, yes well now you see, I have campaigned for years now to have tourists banned from Venice. Stephen: Have you? Have you? Hugh: I have, I have. It sounds very harsh, very cruel, very ... Stephen: Deglante? Hugh: Very deglante, thank you. But I'm sure it's the only way. Leslie: Who was it, who was it, who said "He is a tourist, you are a holidaymaker, but I am a traveller?" Hugh: Oh, was it Humbert Wolfe? Stephen: It was Cocteau, surely? ... etc., etc...
- Scoundreller 7y ago
  I think of it as “Only rich people used to be able to come here, but now people of more moderate means can, oh noes”.
  - skohan 7y ago
    I think it's probably a convergence of relatively cheaper air travel and also network effects due to social media. For instance not too long ago, I was in a particularly scenic beach Italy, and was surprised to find that, while it had previously been a destination mostly for Italians, this year they experienced a large number of American tourists even though it's a bit complicated to reach and it's hard to navigate that region with English alone. I suspect you could trace that shift to a social media post or a travel blog.
    - Scoundreller 7y ago
      I see it as the same. Where before you had to hire your home travel agent to hire a local guide overseas (and know who), you can now do it all yourself via SM. That massively improves accessibility.
  - Grue3 7y ago
    Alternatively, "only white people used to be able to come here".
    - StavrosK 7y ago
      This is a useless comment because it takes a wealth issue and tries to turn it into a racial issue. There are poor white people who couldn't go and rich black people who could go, so it's not even apt to say. Not everything needs to be a matter of race, especially outside the US.
      - Nasrudith 7y ago
        I don't think it is wrong though. I have seen plenty of "too many tourists" complaints that were blatant xenophobia like complaining about hearing too many foreign languages or "feeling like a foreigner in their own country".
- PeterStuer 7y ago
  Dosage matters. Many things that are completely destructive or toxic are not a problem and even beneficial and enriching in small dosage. Tourism is most definitely one of those things. Typically it benefits a very few in the host location while externalizing the destruction of the culture, the environment and the quality of life for the many that have these places as their home. So it is not about 'you' vs 'the others'. It is about the quantity of people exceeding what is a healthy balance.
  - luckylion 7y ago
    > It is about the quantity of people exceeding what is a healthy balance. As it is everywhere. If two people don't pay taxes, society functions just normally. If everybody doesn't pay taxes, there is no funding for even the most basic programs. When the argument is "a bit is fine, just not too much", the second part of the argument should always be "and here's how we determine who gets to enjoy it and who is forbidden from enjoying it".
  - neves 7y ago
    Not just few people. These are great jobs for an uneducated population.
    - PeterStuer 7y ago
      Did you just say 'trickle down'? Trust me, Norway is just fine without these 'Jobs, jobs, jobs!' excuses by which neoliberals try to excuse their socio-economic destructive practices.
      - neves 7y ago
        No, I'm saying that in countries like Brazil, waiter is really decent job. Unfortunately also above average.
- seiko988 7y ago
  Same as: 'You're not stuck in traffic, you are traffic'
- kjaftaedi 7y ago
  Living Iceland, the increased amount of tourists means that everything can no longer be written in the local language so that the tourists can understand, and that when you go to a restaurant, you often can't even order food using icelandic as the staff won't understand you, walking down the street, everyone is speaking English to each other, things that used to be free and offered to the public, now have to come at a charge due to the amount of people trying to take advantage of a place or a service, and the fact that we have several times the amount of tourists as we do locals, it's eroding the culture.. quickly. At least for me, I feel a difference between tourism, and over-tourism.
  - jessaustin 7y ago
    ...you often can't even order food using icelandic as the staff won't understand you... One doubts that the restaurant staff are tourists? You seem to be saying that they aren't Icelandic, however.
    - sigstoat 7y ago
      i don't know about iceland specifically, but at least some countries offer various working visas, so you can stay in the country for a year and work to fund it. the folks using those are bit a more likely to end up with jobs in tourism, because they speak the language of the tourists, and they want to be in tourist destinations themselves, being a different form of tourist.
    - kjaftaedi 7y ago
      increased tourism, has meant an increased demand in everything.. which has meant an increased demand in low-wage jobs, increasingly held by foreigners looking for work. I don't see this as a wholly bad thing, but the negative impact is that the people you interact with in the service industry, are not able to converse with you easily. Imagine living in mexico, walking into a mexican restaraunt, and having to order in english because the wait staff and kitchen can't understand spanish. It's not the worst thing that's ever happened, but I do miss being able to speak my native language outside of close circles.
deleted 7y ago
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pbhjpbhj 7y ago
So, just ignore the problem? That doesn't help.
- ohduran 7y ago
  No. My point is that it's a difficult problem, one that isn't solved by building a wall, be it literally or bureaucratically. My criticism is that this problem is hard. Should we do nothing instead? No. Just think harder.
tonyedgecombe 7y ago
There have been a lot of reasons put forward to justify Brexit, this is the first time I’ve heard tourism used as an excuse.
- ohduran 7y ago
  Not at all. What I meant was that Brexit mentality comes from the idea that you are entitled to decide who comes into "your country" and who doesn't. I lean towards a freer movement, but I understand that others lean towards the opposite, and it's fine. My main argument is that countries are just political constructions, and tourists may leave a destructive footprint wherever they go because they don't feel that land is "theirs". It's a weird issue.
  - PeterStuer 7y ago
    But it doesn't. A tourist is by definition nomadic, just there to reap some short term benefits regardless of the community's long term commitments and trade-offs. Some of them may be altruists foregoing the more destructive pleasures, others will be 100% self-centered and grab everything they can without a single fink given. There is some carrying capacity under which the impacts can be absorbed without straining the community. Above that it can only end into a race to the bottom.
  - pjc50 7y ago
    It's just wrong though - Brexit has been driven by anti-immigration desires but without ever talking about or trying to restrict tourism. Every country makes a distinction between temporary and permanent entry.
skohan 7y ago
I have mixed feelings about this. I used to live in El Raval, and during August I dreaded even leaving the apartment because I knew I would have to fight crowds even to go to the corner and buy milk. I agree with your general premise, that restricting freedom of movement has not historically been a good thing, but I do also think it's a tragic when a beautiful and interesting place gets absolutely overrun by tourists and as a result gets less beautiful and less interesting, and far less livable for the people who stay there year round and don't leave after a couple days. I think tourism can be seen as a problem of negative externalities, much the same way as pollution can: for a few businesses in the community, it's a huge net positive. Hotels and restaurants, for example, make big profits off of tourists in popular destinations, but everyone else has to deal with more litter, crowded streets and higher prices, but doesn't see any of the benefit. Just like we regulate pollution, I think it's possible to find ways to regulate tourism to maximize the collective good. I also think there are ways to regulate tourism without beckoning the "slippery slope" you worry about. For instance, I have been on an island in Thailand which can only be accessed between 8AM and 8PM, does not allow outside plastics of any kind, and charges a modest fee to enter. Measures like that, or increased taxes on accommodation for example, can make it just a little bit harder to visit a popular destination and will probably result in less visitors on average without imposing a quota.
- ohduran 7y ago
  Maybe that's a good idea. Is charging more the solution? Effectively you're making tourism more robust in the area, because it becomes the main source of value for what you can do there (as in, the more expensive it is, the weaker other non-touristic options become, because they attract less profit).
  - skohan 7y ago
    > Effectively you're making tourism more robust in the area, because it becomes the main source of value for what you can do there Not necessarily. For example, a hotel tax could be redistributive: you can take some of the excess value which would only be enjoyed by the business owner and use it to increase the standard of living for the rest of the population in any number of ways (better schools, better roads etc). Also you're making it a bit more expensive to operate that business, so you're putting a thumb on the scale in favor of non-touristic businesses.
magicalhippo 7y ago
> [...] in Barcelona, where 'overtourism' is a much bigger problem than in Norway IMHO [...] We do have quite a lovely but challenging nature here. We have lots of tourists who come here unprepared and some would likely been severely hurt or even died had it not been for volunteers from red cross etc helping them. As the number of tourists increase, we're likely to see more of these unprepared tourists. So it's not just about the numbers, but what they do when they're here. A recent news article (in Norwegian, Google Translate does a decent enough job): https://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/gar-hardt-ut-mot-uvitende-turister-i-norske-fjell/71367818 https://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/gar-hardt-ut-mot-uvitende-t...
- lake99 7y ago
  Education of tourists is something that should be required in lots of other places too. Speaking from an Indian perspective, foreigners coming here should be told about what kind of food is safe to eat, what kinds of people to not trust, etc. I have come across a case where a previously healthy German visitor went back with Hepatitis C, which he got from a dodgy tattoo parlor.
- SOLAR_FIELDS 7y ago
  I did Trolltunga last year and I was amazed to see the amount of miserable people who thought it would be ok to walk up the thing in tennis shoes and shorts. This was in May when there was still knee deep snow in a lot of places. People were taking their dogs too which is an absolutely brutish thing to do to the dog. For those who don’t know, it’s a 10 hour hike, half of which is basically straight up a mountain. Saw at least two people get airlifted off the mountain during my hike. Norway does a decent job of informing people at least on the hike. When you start walking there are signs that say something like “if you are at this point and it’s after 2 pm, turn back around” It’s definitely one of those “Instagram destinations” that attract this sort of behavior. At the actual rock there were a few people flying drones around to get pictures, blatantly disregarding “No drones” signs.
Scoundreller 7y ago
I’m sure the Barcelona based ULCC Vueling really helped those get in.
- PeterStuer 7y ago
  In Barecona's case it was the RyanAir booze flights from the UK that destroyed the city.
  - skohan 7y ago
    When I lived in BCN there was a certain reputation a type for British and German tourists who used the streets as a toilet. It struck me as odd that so many people seemed to view Barcelona as an "anything goes" type of city while the Catalan people are not that wild for the most part and drink socially but not to get drunk.
    - PeterStuer 7y ago
      That is because it was and still is promoted as 'anything goes' in the UK. Google 'Stag Do Barcelona'.
    - porknubbins 7y ago
      My theory on british tourists is that people from uptight, repressed places are looking for somewhere to let loose. Granted the US is uptight too but we don’t have as much drunk hooliganism because we’re strict on alcohol too.
      - xzel 7y ago
        What are you talking about? The US has a huge amount of binge drinking at ages 16-22 and plenty of hooliganism, such as NFL games and holidays. I’ve lived in Barcelona and the only reason there aren’t as many drunk Americans is it’s far from most of the country.
el_cujo 7y ago
This, it feels very weird to me seeing people advocate for basically only allowing the super rich to travel. To a lot of people, travelling abroad isn't just about getting drunk at foreign clubs and leaving trash everywhere, but about experiencing other cultures and having your world-view widened beyond what you see every day. I think most people would argue these things are good, not just for the individual but for society?
- skohan 7y ago
  Solving the problem of over-tourism is different than raising the price of travel overall. When talking about over-tourism, we're only really talking about a few thousand places which attract so many tourists that they cannot function in a healthy place. If you increased the price of tourism in those select places, then yes, you might have the unfortunate outcome that only upper-middle-class people could visit Paris in May, but all those other people could go to smaller cities in central France which are still full of culture to experience, and might stand to benefit a lot from increased tourist revenue. But maybe I am a bit biased because I like to visit obscure places anyway.
  - el_cujo 7y ago
    That's true, I guess I'm conflating "overtourism" specifically with a wider push discouraging people from travel to decrease carbon emissions. You make a fair point, there is plenty of the world left to experience beyond the big hubs like Paris and Rome.
    - graeme 7y ago
      Look at it this way: why is the desire of today's middle class to travel by air more important than the survival of civilization tomorrow? Travel imposes heavy costs on the world, in its current carbon based form. It's only affordable because we pass these costs on to the future.
      - skohan 7y ago
        It's not just the desire to travel by air, it's the economics. When I first moved to Germany I looked into doing a few trips by train, but the flights were much cheaper.
frereubu 7y ago
On a side note, I wish people would stop prefacing their comments with "At the risk of being downvoted..." or "Unpopular opinion here, but..." Just state your point as clearly as you can and allow your arguments to stand or fall on their own. One of the things which drew me to HN was the lack of this kind of language, and I feel like I've seen more and more of it recently.
- nmussy 7y ago
  I completely agree, and this is already mentioned in the guidelines: Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- thedaemon 7y ago
  I wish people wouldn't comment about other people's comments like this. Just up or down vote, this makes for even more boring reading than the comment you mentioned. Here I am breaking my own rule because I cannot down vote your comment.
  - frereubu 7y ago
    But I don't want to downvote their comment (although I don't want to upvote it either). The issue with your suggestion is that a downvote will be seen as a vote on the content of the comment. There isn't a separate "downvote for special pleading" option.
    - mistermann 7y ago
      I think the current guideline on voting should be changed to "do not downvote if you disagree with the sentiment of a comment, provided it is substantive and factual". I see way too many downvoted comments that are purely statements of relevant fact, or are sincere questions. If HN members can't manage being reasonable and logical about controversial subjects, how do we ever expect the average person on the street to do so? No wonder politics is so screwed up these days.
ivanhoe 7y ago
Not necessarily, as you don't restrict people from entering the country, you restrict the availability of accommodations and access to certain protected area. In protected nature parks this has been done for years, you need to buy a ticket to get in, and government controls how many people can enter or even if anyone. In many protected parks some areas are completely off-limits to tourists, so that animals are not disturbed or nature destroyed. Or another example, where I live beaches get closed for tourists when turtles come ashore, and it's been done for years, no one is really upset about it. So why is this different? It's just cities instead of parks and law is protecting the local population instead of animals.
PeterStuer 7y ago
Trying to curb mass tourism leads to Brexit? Are you one of those people that claims eating a candybar leads to intravenous heroin use?
baud147258 7y ago
> You start passing bills on restricting tourism, then the natural next step is being hard on immigration, then Brexit It feels like a slippery slope argument.
- prepend 7y ago
  A slippery slope argument is not necessarily wrong or poor rhetoric. It would help me understand if you would say why this is a poor use of slippery slope. Many relationships naturally follow along a curve so pointing out this relationship should be remarkable for being wrong if you pass along some other info like maybe you think this rarely occurs, or is not logical.
  - deleted 7y ago
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mistermann 7y ago
> You start passing bills on restricting tourism, then the natural next step is being hard on immigration, then Brexit. This is kind of an interesting comment if you overthink it, as I enjoy doing. By my reading, "then the natural next step is being hard on immigration" is a rather boldly axiomatic statement, as if being hard on immigration is _Wrong_, full stop. If others hold the opinion that ~open borders are a Good Thing, that's fine with me because it's an opinion, and everyone is entitled to their own. But when reading forums and the news I constantly get a strong sense that in the last 5 years this subject has rapidly progressed from "matter of opinion" status and deeply into "matter of fact". > The ability to control who goes in and who goes out usually falls on the hand of those that shouldn't have that kind of power. Like democratically elected politicians? Or is there someone else who should decide who gets to hold what power?
- ohduran 7y ago
  It boils down to the fact that borders are artificially constructed. Yeah, even democracy isn't something that came down from the sky. Again, "who are you to block my path?", a very difficult question.
  - mistermann 7y ago
    > It boils down to the fact that borders are artificially constructed. Is that what it "boils down to"? Nothing more and nothing less than "borders are artificially constructed"? It happens to be a technically true statement, but are you saying something along the lines of because borders are artificially constructed then therefore it logically follows that they should be removed? If not, what are you saying, exactly?
- scarejunba 7y ago
  I think it’s just that people believe in the Veil of Ignorance. Why must I be given access and others excluded merely because of an accident of birth? Perhaps all citizenship should be tested into. You put everyone in an immigration queue, including people born in the country. Then you select the best according to a pre-existing rubric.
not_a_cop75 7y ago
All they have to do is allow the immigration of violent sects. Overtourism problem solved.
e12e 7y ago
There's overtourism and then there's overtourism. Up here in Tromsø - one issue is simply fragile nature - without stone paths, people walking around here really harms the environment. Cobblestone pavements fare better. That said, some steps are taken to provide for more visitors - but the work takes time.
not_a_cop75 7y ago
Heaven forbid that people vote against alliances done and controlled by nonelected figures. What is the world coming to? It's like they suddenly hate authoritarian figures or something.

bjornsing 7y ago

Yea it’s a funny word “overtourism”. I guess it’s what you call it when other people go on vacation (whereas when I go on vacation it’s just “tourism”). :P

tonyedgecombe 7y ago
Some of us aren’t convinced whether it’s us travelling or someone else.
ohduran 7y ago
If it's you, then it's a 'traveler' or a 'wonderlust'. The rest of the world are simply 'tourists'. It all comes down to the question "who do you think you are to block my path?" It's not a straightforward answer, though. We've been struggling to answer this as human beings since forever.
- Scoundreller 7y ago
  Instead of the destination country finding a way to charge tourists more to discourage them, source countries could tax them more to resolve the issue and keep the monies for themselves.
- jameshart 7y ago
  Indeed. This exact attitude was satirized in an A Bit of Fry & Laurie sketch waaaay back in 1990: Hugh: Ah, yes well now you see, I have campaigned for years now to have tourists banned from Venice. Stephen: Have you? Have you? Hugh: I have, I have. It sounds very harsh, very cruel, very ... Stephen: Deglante? Hugh: Very deglante, thank you. But I'm sure it's the only way. Leslie: Who was it, who was it, who said "He is a tourist, you are a holidaymaker, but I am a traveller?" Hugh: Oh, was it Humbert Wolfe? Stephen: It was Cocteau, surely? ... etc., etc...
Scoundreller 7y ago
I think of it as “Only rich people used to be able to come here, but now people of more moderate means can, oh noes”.
- skohan 7y ago
  I think it's probably a convergence of relatively cheaper air travel and also network effects due to social media. For instance not too long ago, I was in a particularly scenic beach Italy, and was surprised to find that, while it had previously been a destination mostly for Italians, this year they experienced a large number of American tourists even though it's a bit complicated to reach and it's hard to navigate that region with English alone. I suspect you could trace that shift to a social media post or a travel blog.
  - Scoundreller 7y ago
    I see it as the same. Where before you had to hire your home travel agent to hire a local guide overseas (and know who), you can now do it all yourself via SM. That massively improves accessibility.
- Grue3 7y ago
  Alternatively, "only white people used to be able to come here".
  - StavrosK 7y ago
    This is a useless comment because it takes a wealth issue and tries to turn it into a racial issue. There are poor white people who couldn't go and rich black people who could go, so it's not even apt to say. Not everything needs to be a matter of race, especially outside the US.
    - Nasrudith 7y ago
      I don't think it is wrong though. I have seen plenty of "too many tourists" complaints that were blatant xenophobia like complaining about hearing too many foreign languages or "feeling like a foreigner in their own country".
PeterStuer 7y ago
Dosage matters. Many things that are completely destructive or toxic are not a problem and even beneficial and enriching in small dosage. Tourism is most definitely one of those things. Typically it benefits a very few in the host location while externalizing the destruction of the culture, the environment and the quality of life for the many that have these places as their home. So it is not about 'you' vs 'the others'. It is about the quantity of people exceeding what is a healthy balance.
- luckylion 7y ago
  > It is about the quantity of people exceeding what is a healthy balance. As it is everywhere. If two people don't pay taxes, society functions just normally. If everybody doesn't pay taxes, there is no funding for even the most basic programs. When the argument is "a bit is fine, just not too much", the second part of the argument should always be "and here's how we determine who gets to enjoy it and who is forbidden from enjoying it".
- neves 7y ago
  Not just few people. These are great jobs for an uneducated population.
  - PeterStuer 7y ago
    Did you just say 'trickle down'? Trust me, Norway is just fine without these 'Jobs, jobs, jobs!' excuses by which neoliberals try to excuse their socio-economic destructive practices.
    - neves 7y ago
      No, I'm saying that in countries like Brazil, waiter is really decent job. Unfortunately also above average.
seiko988 7y ago
Same as: 'You're not stuck in traffic, you are traffic'
kjaftaedi 7y ago
Living Iceland, the increased amount of tourists means that everything can no longer be written in the local language so that the tourists can understand, and that when you go to a restaurant, you often can't even order food using icelandic as the staff won't understand you, walking down the street, everyone is speaking English to each other, things that used to be free and offered to the public, now have to come at a charge due to the amount of people trying to take advantage of a place or a service, and the fact that we have several times the amount of tourists as we do locals, it's eroding the culture.. quickly. At least for me, I feel a difference between tourism, and over-tourism.
- jessaustin 7y ago
  ...you often can't even order food using icelandic as the staff won't understand you... One doubts that the restaurant staff are tourists? You seem to be saying that they aren't Icelandic, however.
  - sigstoat 7y ago
    i don't know about iceland specifically, but at least some countries offer various working visas, so you can stay in the country for a year and work to fund it. the folks using those are bit a more likely to end up with jobs in tourism, because they speak the language of the tourists, and they want to be in tourist destinations themselves, being a different form of tourist.
  - kjaftaedi 7y ago
    increased tourism, has meant an increased demand in everything.. which has meant an increased demand in low-wage jobs, increasingly held by foreigners looking for work. I don't see this as a wholly bad thing, but the negative impact is that the people you interact with in the service industry, are not able to converse with you easily. Imagine living in mexico, walking into a mexican restaraunt, and having to order in english because the wait staff and kitchen can't understand spanish. It's not the worst thing that's ever happened, but I do miss being able to speak my native language outside of close circles.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

pbhjpbhj 7y ago

So, just ignore the problem? That doesn't help.

ohduran 7y ago
No. My point is that it's a difficult problem, one that isn't solved by building a wall, be it literally or bureaucratically. My criticism is that this problem is hard. Should we do nothing instead? No. Just think harder.

tonyedgecombe 7y ago

There have been a lot of reasons put forward to justify Brexit, this is the first time I’ve heard tourism used as an excuse.

ohduran 7y ago
Not at all. What I meant was that Brexit mentality comes from the idea that you are entitled to decide who comes into "your country" and who doesn't. I lean towards a freer movement, but I understand that others lean towards the opposite, and it's fine. My main argument is that countries are just political constructions, and tourists may leave a destructive footprint wherever they go because they don't feel that land is "theirs". It's a weird issue.
- PeterStuer 7y ago
  But it doesn't. A tourist is by definition nomadic, just there to reap some short term benefits regardless of the community's long term commitments and trade-offs. Some of them may be altruists foregoing the more destructive pleasures, others will be 100% self-centered and grab everything they can without a single fink given. There is some carrying capacity under which the impacts can be absorbed without straining the community. Above that it can only end into a race to the bottom.
- pjc50 7y ago
  It's just wrong though - Brexit has been driven by anti-immigration desires but without ever talking about or trying to restrict tourism. Every country makes a distinction between temporary and permanent entry.

skohan 7y ago

I have mixed feelings about this. I used to live in El Raval, and during August I dreaded even leaving the apartment because I knew I would have to fight crowds even to go to the corner and buy milk. I agree with your general premise, that restricting freedom of movement has not historically been a good thing, but I do also think it's a tragic when a beautiful and interesting place gets absolutely overrun by tourists and as a result gets less beautiful and less interesting, and far less livable for the people who stay there year round and don't leave after a couple days. I think tourism can be seen as a problem of negative externalities, much the same way as pollution can: for a few businesses in the community, it's a huge net positive. Hotels and restaurants, for example, make big profits off of tourists in popular destinations, but everyone else has to deal with more litter, crowded streets and higher prices, but doesn't see any of the benefit. Just like we regulate pollution, I think it's possible to find ways to regulate tourism to maximize the collective good. I also think there are ways to regulate tourism without beckoning the "slippery slope" you worry about. For instance, I have been on an island in Thailand which can only be accessed between 8AM and 8PM, does not allow outside plastics of any kind, and charges a modest fee to enter. Measures like that, or increased taxes on accommodation for example, can make it just a little bit harder to visit a popular destination and will probably result in less visitors on average without imposing a quota.

ohduran 7y ago
Maybe that's a good idea. Is charging more the solution? Effectively you're making tourism more robust in the area, because it becomes the main source of value for what you can do there (as in, the more expensive it is, the weaker other non-touristic options become, because they attract less profit).
- skohan 7y ago
  > Effectively you're making tourism more robust in the area, because it becomes the main source of value for what you can do there Not necessarily. For example, a hotel tax could be redistributive: you can take some of the excess value which would only be enjoyed by the business owner and use it to increase the standard of living for the rest of the population in any number of ways (better schools, better roads etc). Also you're making it a bit more expensive to operate that business, so you're putting a thumb on the scale in favor of non-touristic businesses.

magicalhippo 7y ago

> [...] in Barcelona, where 'overtourism' is a much bigger problem than in Norway IMHO [...] We do have quite a lovely but challenging nature here. We have lots of tourists who come here unprepared and some would likely been severely hurt or even died had it not been for volunteers from red cross etc helping them. As the number of tourists increase, we're likely to see more of these unprepared tourists. So it's not just about the numbers, but what they do when they're here. A recent news article (in Norwegian, Google Translate does a decent enough job): https://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/gar-hardt-ut-mot-uvitende-turister-i-norske-fjell/71367818 https://www.dagbladet.no/nyheter/gar-hardt-ut-mot-uvitende-t...

lake99 7y ago
Education of tourists is something that should be required in lots of other places too. Speaking from an Indian perspective, foreigners coming here should be told about what kind of food is safe to eat, what kinds of people to not trust, etc. I have come across a case where a previously healthy German visitor went back with Hepatitis C, which he got from a dodgy tattoo parlor.
SOLAR_FIELDS 7y ago
I did Trolltunga last year and I was amazed to see the amount of miserable people who thought it would be ok to walk up the thing in tennis shoes and shorts. This was in May when there was still knee deep snow in a lot of places. People were taking their dogs too which is an absolutely brutish thing to do to the dog. For those who don’t know, it’s a 10 hour hike, half of which is basically straight up a mountain. Saw at least two people get airlifted off the mountain during my hike. Norway does a decent job of informing people at least on the hike. When you start walking there are signs that say something like “if you are at this point and it’s after 2 pm, turn back around” It’s definitely one of those “Instagram destinations” that attract this sort of behavior. At the actual rock there were a few people flying drones around to get pictures, blatantly disregarding “No drones” signs.

Scoundreller 7y ago

I’m sure the Barcelona based ULCC Vueling really helped those get in.

PeterStuer 7y ago
In Barecona's case it was the RyanAir booze flights from the UK that destroyed the city.
- skohan 7y ago
  When I lived in BCN there was a certain reputation a type for British and German tourists who used the streets as a toilet. It struck me as odd that so many people seemed to view Barcelona as an "anything goes" type of city while the Catalan people are not that wild for the most part and drink socially but not to get drunk.
  - PeterStuer 7y ago
    That is because it was and still is promoted as 'anything goes' in the UK. Google 'Stag Do Barcelona'.
  - porknubbins 7y ago
    My theory on british tourists is that people from uptight, repressed places are looking for somewhere to let loose. Granted the US is uptight too but we don’t have as much drunk hooliganism because we’re strict on alcohol too.
    - xzel 7y ago
      What are you talking about? The US has a huge amount of binge drinking at ages 16-22 and plenty of hooliganism, such as NFL games and holidays. I’ve lived in Barcelona and the only reason there aren’t as many drunk Americans is it’s far from most of the country.

el_cujo 7y ago

This, it feels very weird to me seeing people advocate for basically only allowing the super rich to travel. To a lot of people, travelling abroad isn't just about getting drunk at foreign clubs and leaving trash everywhere, but about experiencing other cultures and having your world-view widened beyond what you see every day. I think most people would argue these things are good, not just for the individual but for society?

skohan 7y ago
Solving the problem of over-tourism is different than raising the price of travel overall. When talking about over-tourism, we're only really talking about a few thousand places which attract so many tourists that they cannot function in a healthy place. If you increased the price of tourism in those select places, then yes, you might have the unfortunate outcome that only upper-middle-class people could visit Paris in May, but all those other people could go to smaller cities in central France which are still full of culture to experience, and might stand to benefit a lot from increased tourist revenue. But maybe I am a bit biased because I like to visit obscure places anyway.
- el_cujo 7y ago
  That's true, I guess I'm conflating "overtourism" specifically with a wider push discouraging people from travel to decrease carbon emissions. You make a fair point, there is plenty of the world left to experience beyond the big hubs like Paris and Rome.
  - graeme 7y ago
    Look at it this way: why is the desire of today's middle class to travel by air more important than the survival of civilization tomorrow? Travel imposes heavy costs on the world, in its current carbon based form. It's only affordable because we pass these costs on to the future.
    - skohan 7y ago
      It's not just the desire to travel by air, it's the economics. When I first moved to Germany I looked into doing a few trips by train, but the flights were much cheaper.

frereubu 7y ago

On a side note, I wish people would stop prefacing their comments with "At the risk of being downvoted..." or "Unpopular opinion here, but..." Just state your point as clearly as you can and allow your arguments to stand or fall on their own. One of the things which drew me to HN was the lack of this kind of language, and I feel like I've seen more and more of it recently.

nmussy 7y ago
I completely agree, and this is already mentioned in the guidelines: Please don't comment about the voting on comments. It never does any good, and it makes boring reading. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
thedaemon 7y ago
I wish people wouldn't comment about other people's comments like this. Just up or down vote, this makes for even more boring reading than the comment you mentioned. Here I am breaking my own rule because I cannot down vote your comment.
- frereubu 7y ago
  But I don't want to downvote their comment (although I don't want to upvote it either). The issue with your suggestion is that a downvote will be seen as a vote on the content of the comment. There isn't a separate "downvote for special pleading" option.
  - mistermann 7y ago
    I think the current guideline on voting should be changed to "do not downvote if you disagree with the sentiment of a comment, provided it is substantive and factual". I see way too many downvoted comments that are purely statements of relevant fact, or are sincere questions. If HN members can't manage being reasonable and logical about controversial subjects, how do we ever expect the average person on the street to do so? No wonder politics is so screwed up these days.

ivanhoe 7y ago

Not necessarily, as you don't restrict people from entering the country, you restrict the availability of accommodations and access to certain protected area. In protected nature parks this has been done for years, you need to buy a ticket to get in, and government controls how many people can enter or even if anyone. In many protected parks some areas are completely off-limits to tourists, so that animals are not disturbed or nature destroyed. Or another example, where I live beaches get closed for tourists when turtles come ashore, and it's been done for years, no one is really upset about it. So why is this different? It's just cities instead of parks and law is protecting the local population instead of animals.

PeterStuer 7y ago

Trying to curb mass tourism leads to Brexit? Are you one of those people that claims eating a candybar leads to intravenous heroin use?

baud147258 7y ago

> You start passing bills on restricting tourism, then the natural next step is being hard on immigration, then Brexit It feels like a slippery slope argument.

prepend 7y ago
A slippery slope argument is not necessarily wrong or poor rhetoric. It would help me understand if you would say why this is a poor use of slippery slope. Many relationships naturally follow along a curve so pointing out this relationship should be remarkable for being wrong if you pass along some other info like maybe you think this rarely occurs, or is not logical.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]

mistermann 7y ago

> You start passing bills on restricting tourism, then the natural next step is being hard on immigration, then Brexit. This is kind of an interesting comment if you overthink it, as I enjoy doing. By my reading, "then the natural next step is being hard on immigration" is a rather boldly axiomatic statement, as if being hard on immigration is _Wrong_, full stop. If others hold the opinion that ~open borders are a Good Thing, that's fine with me because it's an opinion, and everyone is entitled to their own. But when reading forums and the news I constantly get a strong sense that in the last 5 years this subject has rapidly progressed from "matter of opinion" status and deeply into "matter of fact". > The ability to control who goes in and who goes out usually falls on the hand of those that shouldn't have that kind of power. Like democratically elected politicians? Or is there someone else who should decide who gets to hold what power?

ohduran 7y ago
It boils down to the fact that borders are artificially constructed. Yeah, even democracy isn't something that came down from the sky. Again, "who are you to block my path?", a very difficult question.
- mistermann 7y ago
  > It boils down to the fact that borders are artificially constructed. Is that what it "boils down to"? Nothing more and nothing less than "borders are artificially constructed"? It happens to be a technically true statement, but are you saying something along the lines of because borders are artificially constructed then therefore it logically follows that they should be removed? If not, what are you saying, exactly?
scarejunba 7y ago
I think it’s just that people believe in the Veil of Ignorance. Why must I be given access and others excluded merely because of an accident of birth? Perhaps all citizenship should be tested into. You put everyone in an immigration queue, including people born in the country. Then you select the best according to a pre-existing rubric.

not_a_cop75 7y ago

All they have to do is allow the immigration of violent sects. Overtourism problem solved.

e12e 7y ago

There's overtourism and then there's overtourism. Up here in Tromsø - one issue is simply fragile nature - without stone paths, people walking around here really harms the environment. Cobblestone pavements fare better. That said, some steps are taken to provide for more visitors - but the work takes time.

not_a_cop75 7y ago

Heaven forbid that people vote against alliances done and controlled by nonelected figures. What is the world coming to? It's like they suddenly hate authoritarian figures or something.