Articles tagged “overtourism”

Cities across Europe are wising up to the potential problem of too many tourists. Those tasked with marketing an "at risk" destination are going to have to work harder to spread tourism over a wider area in order to dilute the potential negative impact.

The Great Wall of China doesn’t need Hollywood to remain one of the world’s wonders. But stampedes of Chinese tourists still threaten an edifice that northern armies failed to conquer.

In many destinations, tourism profits are "found" money with no strings attached. That's great for short-term gains, and so very terrible for long-term thinking.

UNESCO sites -- of all places -- should be the destinations taking leadership roles in tourism management planning as they're often the first place many tourists think about when deciding what to do on a trip. But data show that's far from reality for a variety of political and economic reasons.

Residents of Bruges support tourism and feel that it's economically necessary but they also feel that it negatively impacts their quality of life.

A global surge in tourism, driven by the growth of low-cost carriers and middle class families across the world who are beginning to vacation abroad, has had deep ramifications for the world’s most popular destinations. Some have tried to manage tourism by limiting the ability of tourists to stay in cities or pushing less popular areas as bona fide tourist destinations. The jury is still out on whether these destinations will be able to effectively manage tourism, or will continue to struggle in the face of mounting backlash from their citizens.

It's every destination marketing organization's goal to drive visitation to their destination. But as Iceland's ascent as a global tourism giant has shown, explosive growth can bring its own problems and drawbacks.

Our storytelling ambitions at Skift are growing bigger, and this year we've leaned into these big editorial projects in a big way. The key animating function for us is understanding the big picture around travel that you otherwise won't read in other travel or mainstream media. Expect deeper reporting from us over the coming year as well.

Tourism can be a great economic driver, but massive growth isn't always sustainable. Iceland now grapples what we call overtourism and has some serious planning to do for the future.

If Iceland wants to do a better job spreading its massive influx of visitors around the country, it's going to need to more than one domestic flight out of Keflavik.