Carrying capacity, mass tourism, and overtourism

Scroll down for posts that have been tagged with “Car­ry­ing capa­city & mass tour­ism & overtourism”.

Accord­ing to the Bio­logy Dic­tion­ary: “[C]arrying capa­city relates the num­ber of organ­isms which can sur­vive to the resources with­in an eco­sys­tem. Eco­sys­tems can­not exceed their car­ry­ing capa­city [for long].” Some travel & tour­ism stake­hold­ers refer to a des­tin­a­tion’s sus­tain­able capa­city to receive vis­it­ors as its ‘car­ry­ing capacity’.

Mass tour­ism is char­ac­ter­ised by large con­cen­tra­tions of tour­ists at the same place at the same time. The travel & tour­ism industry facil­it­ates mass tour­ism through organ­ised group tours, pack­age deals, shore vis­its by cruise ship pas­sen­gers, and sim­il­ar practices.

Over­tour­ism is the per­cep­tion, espe­cially among res­id­ents, of too much tour­ism at a des­tin­a­tion or simply too many vis­it­ors to a place. Envir­on­ment­al car­ry­ing capa­cit­ies not­with­stand­ing, over­tour­ism is sub­ject­ive. There need not be indus­tri­al-scale mass tour­ism for a host com­munity to feel the effects of over­tour­ism. Mass tour­ism is often the cause of over­tour­ism in ‘nor­mal’ neigh­bour­hoods, but not in des­tin­a­tions or attrac­tions that have been planned and pur­pose-built to receive large num­bers of tour­ists, and whose res­id­ent pop­u­la­tions wel­come the eco­nom­ic oppor­tun­it­ies mass tour­ism brings.

“The phe­nomen­on of ‘over­tour­ism’, about which there are always lots of com­plaints, is a symp­tom of an unhealthy depend­ence on tour­ism for jobs and eco­nom­ic activ­ity. We know that, yet this depend­ence is why little gets done to solve the prob­lem. It is polit­ic­ally and eco­nom­ic­ally dif­fi­cult to solve because the with­draw­al symp­toms are rough.” _ Dav­id Gill­banks in “As we sit out COVID-19, let’s think about a fair & fail-safe treat­ment or vac­cine for over­tour­ism”.

Tags are inform­al. The “Good Tour­ism” Blog tries not to get bogged down with ter­min­o­logy and defin­i­tions, so you may dis­agree with tags applied (or not applied) to a post. If so, please feel free to com­ment on any post you think has been incor­rectly or insuf­fi­ciently tagged. “GT” encour­ages good-faith debate and discussion.

For real: Barcelona’s housing crisis caused by anti-hospitality policy, not tourism

November 17, 2024
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What caused Barcelona's housing crisis? Tourism? Or anti-tourism policy? El Pórtico de la Lavandera, Park Güell, Barcelona, Spain. Image by LoggaWiggler (CC0) via Pixabay. https://pixabay.com/photos/park-g%C3%BCell-gaud%C3%AD-5238/

Prop­erty man­age­ment pro­fes­sion­al Saverio Francesco Ber­to­lu­cci shares his views on Bar­celon­a’s hous­ing crisis and the anti-tour­ism polit­ics at play in his adop­ted home city.  Pub­lished in col­lab­or­a­tion with Tourism’s Hori­zon: Travel for the Mil­lions, a “Good Tour­ism” Insight Part­ner, it’s Mr Ber­to­lu­c­ci’s sev­enth “GT” Insight. [You too can write a “GT” Insight.] On the anti-tour­ism radar The most […]

Read More For real: Barcelona’s housing crisis caused by anti-hospitality policy, not tourism

A matter of taste: Travellers, tourists, and ‘tourism for peace’

November 4, 2024
One Comment

Travellers, tourists, and tourism for peace ... Picture of flat tyre with peace sign hub cap by Charles Pickrell (CC0) via Unsplash.

Does being a ‘trav­el­ler’ or a ‘tour­ist’ have any­thing to do with ‘tour­ism for peace’? Jim Butcher ques­tions Fabio Car­bone’s cari­ca­ture of arrog­ant tour­ists and his claim that only trav­el­lers hold the keys to world peace.  A grand claim Fabio Car­bone, glob­al ambas­sad­or of the Inter­na­tion­al Insti­tute of Peace Through Tour­ism (a notion endorsed by the United Nations […]

Read More A matter of taste: Travellers, tourists, and ‘tourism for peace’

Three critics walk into a bar …

September 10, 2024

Three critics walk into a bar … "Good Tourism" Insight Bites. Sign photos by Steve Allison via Unsplash. https://unsplash.com/photos/bar-led-signage-LRx-y4bRdMA

Three crit­ics — a set­tler colo­ni­al­ism crit­ic, an illeg­al immig­ra­tion crit­ic, and a mass tour­ism crit­ic — walk into a bar …  Is this the set-up for a joke or a real pos­sib­il­ity? What shared con­cerns might they dis­cuss, and where might their per­spect­ives diverge? It’s a “Good Tour­ism” Insight Bites ques­tion. Your cor­res­pond­ent put the ques­tion to the travel & tour­ism stake­hold­ers in […]

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Can we manage mass tourism for sustainable, equitable, and progressive outcomes?

July 30, 2024
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Can we manage mass tourism for sustainable, equitable, progressive outcomes? Image generated by Copilot.

If one assumes that mass tour­ism is unavoid­able without an author­it­ari­an crack­down on mobil­ity, what should be done about it? Kev­in Phun sug­gests that in every chal­lenge lies an oppor­tun­ity, and pro­poses how we might man­age mass tour­ism for sus­tain­able, equit­able, and pro­gress­ive out­comes. In less than two hours’ time (as I write this), I will […]

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Prof Valeria Minghetti on peer review, overtourism, regenerative tourism, and how to succeed


Professor Valeria Minghetti: "[B]e curious. Never stop asking yourself questions. Curiosity and the desire to find solutions is what makes a difference ..."

“Nev­er stop ask­ing your­self ques­tions. Curi­os­ity and the desire to find solu­tions is what makes a dif­fer­ence,” accord­ing to Valer­ia Minghetti. Such an atti­tude will take young­sters a long way in travel & tour­ism, she reck­ons. And it must be redoubled at the very highest levels of aca­demia and industry. Saverio F Ber­to­lu­cci inter­viewed Prof Minghetti […]

Read More Prof Valeria Minghetti on peer review, overtourism, regenerative tourism, and how to succeed

Venice ‘bookable’: Italians lose freedom of movement

May 8, 2024
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Are Venice’s new day-tripper rules and regulations having the desired effect? Or are they unreasonably restricting Italians' freedom of movement? Venice carnival masks image by Leo (CC0) via Pixabay. https://pixabay.com/photos/venice-mask-venice-venice-carnival-4764619/ "GT" added "Halt!"

Are Venice’s new day-trip­per rules hav­ing the desired effect? Or are they unreas­on­ably restrict­ing Itali­ans’ free­dom of move­ment? This is Domin­ic Standish’s second “Good Tour­ism” Insight at the invit­a­tion of Tourism’s Hori­zon, a “GT” Insight Part­ner. [You too can write a “GT” Insight. Your organ­isa­tion can also become a “GT” Part­ner.] Book­ings and fees Since April 25, […]

Read More Venice ‘bookable’: Italians lose freedom of movement