Barcelona's tourism industry, by some accounts, may be too successful. Bolstered by heavy interest in the city, it has frustrated locals and driven up costs.
As Travel + Leisure reports, the government continues to launch one initiative after another to combat a peculiar dilemma (that many other destinations would probably love to have).
The latest is the one championed by Barcelona mayor Ada Colau who launched the positive-sounding Strategic Plan For Tourism 2020. It's a snapshot of how the city feels about visitors at the moment and a dramatic effort to pull back the reins on tourism that officials believe has adversely affected its citizens.
One plan is to increase the taxes on vacation apartments that pepper the city. The campaign also eyes such policies as raising parking to curtail Spanish citizens outside the Catalan capital looking to Barcelona for a simple day abroad. The plan includes possible regulations on bed-and-breakfast rooms, restricting access to Segway devices and pushing back curbside restaurants from sidewalks.
Barcelona, in effect, is attempting to make its amazing city a far less desirable destination for both tourists from foreign countries as well as those who might be coming in from a few miles out of town.
It's an initiative that comes after Barcelona officials saw fit to ban any new hotel installations from rising above the city center.
[READMORE]READ MORE: Barcelona: Three Hotels, One Amazing City [/READMORE]
TravelPulse's Patrick Clarke reported on that massive move this January and explains how an enticing city can feel so outwardly frustrated with tourists.
Simply put, many are utilizing illegally run vacation apartments, and not hotels, thereby driving up the price of rent to exorbitant levels.
Barcelona hoteliers association's Manel Casals explained at the time: "Of the 32 million people who visited Barcelona last year, only 8 million stayed in hotels. Twenty-three million were day-trippers who spend very little money in the city. You're not going to regulate tourism by limiting the number of beds. They're not regulating tourism, they're only regulating where people sleep."
CNN Money quotes a city council member who explained this past January: "Barcelona is receiving more and more touristsEveryone wants to come here. That's nice, but we're conscious that people who live in Barcelona are having more and more problems with tourism. We are not against tourism. But we need rules."
Prior to taking office, mayor Ada Colau Ballano explained that tourism weighed heavily on her mind and said locals could expect such actions as limiting short-term apartment rentals. A couple years later and the city is getting proactive before it starts to see its locals look elsewhere for housing.
This hardly makes us want to visit this wonderful destination any less, which is part of the problem. Barcelona will undoubtedly continue to draw immense numbers of tourists.
CNN Money puts that number at 30 million visitors every year. It's a daunting number that is certainly shaping Barcelona and its policies for the future.
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