Was last summer a turning point for European tourism?

Protesters stage a hunger strike against the development of tourism. Local officials threaten to cut off water to illegal vacation rentals. Residents spray tourists with water guns.

Los European hotspots like Barcelona, ​​Spain; Athens and the Greek islands of Santorini have reached a breaking point, making the tourists the target of more reaction. While final visitor numbers for the summer are not yet in place, they are expected to surpass 2019 levels; In the second quarter alone, international arrivals exceeded those of 2019 by 6%, according to the European Travel Commission.

Climate change also put a tremendous pressure on popular destinations.

July was the 14th month of the planet’s heat recordas reported by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and Spain and Greece experienced some of their record-breaking hottest days, with temperatures exceeding 46°C.

While tourism is a critical economic driver For many European destinations, some residents argue that they should invest more tourism profits in communities and infrastructure.

“We have been invaded by tourists; the situation is out of control,” said Camila Guzmán, 32, a resident of Palma, on the Spanish island of Mallorca. Guzmán participated in the July protests that mobilized more than 50,000 people. Prices have risen too much, he said, so much so that “we can’t afford to live here anymore.”

Elsewhere, locals demonstrated against disrespectful behavior by tourists and the construction of a new hotel and villa.

Some places impose limits on visitors. For example, Ile-de-Bréhat, a French island off the coast of Brittany with just 400 residents, recently imposed a limit on 4,700 visitors per day.

The pandemic, in addition, exacerbated the complaints of locals after the residents had a notion of what life is like without tourists. When travel restrictions were left behind, the crowds they came back in droves.

“This summer was the perfect storm, with a combination of issues, including Excessive quantities, bad behavior and climate change” said Richard Butler, emeritus professor in hospitality and tourism management at the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow, and author of several books on mass tourism.

At the end of the frenetic summer, we see some of the breaking points.

The influx of tourists this summer put Athens under tremendous threat as it struggled with the excessive heatas well as with the water shortage.

Forest fires that swept across Greece destroyed forests in the Attica region, even expanding into the suburbs of Athens.

While temperatures rose to 41 degrees Celsius, authorities They closed the Acropolis during the hottest hours.

Last year, the old site introduced a ticket system for manage the number of visitorswith a limit of 20,000 per day.

Los Protesters against mass tourism broke out in July in Athens, with “No Tourists” graffiti strewn across buildings and residents calling for a crackdown on vacation rentals, which they say are taking over entire neighborhoods.

Santorini, famous for its whitewashed buildings and for its sunsets, it was one of the largest mass tourism destinations in Europe last summer, which attracted approximately 3.5 million visitors to an island of 15,000.

Los cruises – 800 ships that attracted 1.3 million visitors – were a source of increased foot traffic according to the Hellenic Ports Association.

More recently, residents were outraged when Panagiotis Kavallaris, president of the island’s municipal community, posted on social media, urging locals to limit their movements to accommodate more than 11,000 passenger cruise ships which were expected to arrive on July 24.

The post was later deleted, the Greek newspaper Kathimerini reported, and the mayor, Nikolaos Zorzos, said the island could reinstate the limit of 8,000 passengers per daybelow what it would have been, about 17,000 at the beginning of 2025.

In Greece, at least six foreign tourists, including BBC television journalist Michael Mosley, were believed to have died from heat exhaustion. Drought and pressurized conditions strained water supplies for tourism development, leaving, in turn, water shortage in the countrycausing islands such as Sifnos and Crete to be declared state of emergency.

In the first six months of this year, the number of tourists who visited Spain increased by 13.3% and exceeded 42.5 million, according to the Ministry of Tourism.

Several cities are taking action about it.

For example, Seville is taking action regarding vacation rentals, after a court ruling allowed the mayor’s office to conduct a review and make water supply cuts to illegal vacation rentals.

In Barcelona, ​​the Neighborhood Assembly for the decrease in tourism called for a review in the tourism model of the city, including the restriction of the number of cruises and regulations for short-term rentals. The city government said it would eliminate such rents by the end of 2028 and announced a increase in tourism tax which will take effect for the month of October.

In several places, the residents staged protests and they gathered signatures to pressure the government to take action.

The demonstrations were held in Mallorca, Malaga, the Canary Islands and Barcelona. In April, activists in Tenerife They staged a hunger strike to protest against two important tourist developments.

“The residents They live in makeshift shacks because they cannot afford their homes. while millions of euros are invested in projects for mega tourism,” said Javier Toro, a 23-year-old Tenerife resident, who participated in the protests.

In April Venice, a city of 50,000 inhabitants that received some 20 million travelers last year, introduced an income tax of 5 euros (about $5.60) designed to discourage day-trippers from visiting the city in high season.

The pilot program, which ended in July, was declared a success by the city’s mayor, Luigi Brugnaro, who said it generated 2.43 million euros, but critics said the fee barely helped curve the numbers.

Local officials said the funds from the fees could help them plan for next year.

Several residents said the city should focus more on higher pressure issues such as short-term rental regulations and in improving local services.

“The 5 euro fee it’s a joke for tourists; they would pay even more money for a beer,” said Lorenzo Cataldi, a tour guide.

He also criticized the new limit of 25 people per walking group, saying it did little to prevent mass crowds: it only caused groups to split into two guides but still remain close to each other.

The narrow streets of the capital of Portugal became sidewalks congested with tuk-tuks and tourists who, according to some residents, reacted reluctantly to having to leave their homes in the summer.

“Es like walking out of a football stadium after a game — complete chaos and I don’t recognize my neighbors anymore,” said Ann Cal, 68, a resident of the Alfama neighborhood, which she says has been overrun with vacation rentals.

“Some days I don’t want to leave my apartment.”

A housing group in Lisbon started a campaign to support a referendum that would ban vacation rentals in residential buildings. The group said it had collected enough signatures to present the project to the local council.

Last month, the Lisbon City Council announced that would limit the number of licenses and parking space given to tuk-tuk drivers in order to help facilitate decongestion.

Amsterdam, one of the most touristy cities from around the world, managed a record of 23 million visitors last year.

After the pandemic, a series of rigorous measures were introduced, including a maximum of 20 million annual visitor numbers.

Over the past year, the tourism taxes increased; the number of cruise ships, which today have prohibited to dock in the center of the city, was limited; new hotel construction was banned; and vacation rentals were restricted.

The city, in turn, is divided with a bad behavior campaign called “Stay Away,” primarily aimed at unruly British male tourists aged 18 to 35, who developed a reputation for drinking a lot of alcohol and harassing residents.

The online campaign aims to potential criminals with videos showing the consequences of antisocial behavior, including arrests and fines. The city, in turn, banned the consumption of marijuana on the streets and is about to discourage the sale of alcohol in the red light district.