In quite a number of cities, protests against ‘overtourism’ have become commonplace, with locals hoping to balance being a visitor attraction with a desire for a ‘normal’ local life.
It’s always a fraught question, because with the hordes of visitors come wads of money that supports local business, especially the businesses that support the tourism. Now a new study by The Economist has matched up the numbers with some interesting insights.
Using numbers from a variety of sources, the Economist found that Amsterdam, one of the hotspots of protest and government action to limit tourism, has both the highest ratio of visitor arrivals to residents (10.1:1) and the biggest average amount of visitor spending per resident ($11,200).
Barcelona, the other of the two main protest sites, came in at #4 on both measures, with 5.9 visitors per resident and $5,100 visitor spending per resident.
There isn’t, by the way, a real correlation between the two measures; Milan, #3 on the visitors per local list sees only $2,600 in spending, less than a quarter of Amsterdam’s. London and Tokyo at #11 and #14 on the arrivals per resident list have the largest actual totals, but also very large populations. The visitor spend per resident is relatively low.
