Overtourism: Why more cities are taking steps to keep out visitors

Europe's most visited destinations have started taking measures to tackle overtourism, including introducing entrance fees, visitor zones and tourist taxes.

Venice is experiencing such a surge in visitors that it has implemented what can be considered as a citywide entrance fee ranging from €3 to €10 ($3.21 to $10.69). It also charges day-trippers a €5 entry fee.

Paris has almost tripled its tourist tax rates to handle the heavy visitor load.

Amsterdam has banned the construction of new hotels to tackle overtourism and Florence has stopped issuing new permits for Airbnbs and short-term rentals in its historic center for making more homes available for locals.

Barcelona has raised its tourist tax by €0.50 per night to help control the number of visitors.

More destinations are expected to adopt successful strategies from other regions and implement them locally, according to Harold Goodwin, managing director of the Responsible Tourism Partnership, an organization working specifically on tourism-related issues.

"We are seeing national governments responding by giving more power to local authorities to manage tourism in their destination," Goodwin told Anadolu, adding that this is likely to be a "continuing trend."

He noted that the Welsh and Scottish governments have both introduced the opportunity for local authorities to impose higher levels of property tax on second homes and holiday homes.

He said other cities will look at what other destinations are doing to combat overtourism and will employ the same remedies.

"The problem is what you can do as a local authority, city council is determined by what the national legislation permits you to do," Goodwin said.

The Croatian city of "Dubrovnik was able to make much more rapid progress in controlling cruise lines than either Venice or Barcelona because in Dubrovnik, the mayor has authority over the number of boats, which dock on any one day," he added.

In Barcelona too, the mayor has those powers, but Venice is under the national government, he said.

"So part of the challenge is to look at what powers you have got locally and therefore how you can intervene using the administrative powers that are provided for you by the central government."

"It is not a massive political priority in Madrid in the way that it is a massive political priority in Barcelona and the Canary Islands, and that will be true in other countries as well," Goodwin added.

The impacts of overtourism are diverse, encompassing three main factors: overcrowding, tourist behavior and a sense of accommodation problems mainly felt by residents, he said.

There is "the sense that you can no longer afford to live in your place or your children can't find anywhere to live because of the pressure of tourist accommodation.”

"We hear examples of people living in tents or caves or shacks in order to be able to work in the hotels because there simply isn't enough accommodation for local people."

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