Something feels very wrong here…
It is a tourist city after all. And the article states “The city’s main tourist accommodation sector, almost twice the number of hotel accommodations”.
New regulations outline that holiday homes cannot exceed more than 2 percent
Why are they fighting reality?
It’s not fighting reality, reality is that the city can’t accommodate so many tourists, demand is high, so prices need to go up.
The last thing you’d want is for your city to become a tourist city. Nobody wins except for property owners to who can make more money renting their apartments to tourists than to locals, and shop owners who can charge abhorrent prices for basic groceries because tourists don’t know any better.
Ask the people of Prague and Barcelona. There’s a good video by the Honest Guide on how Prague 1 became a sort of “theme park” for tourists, and is absolutely unliveable for people from Prague.
It is especially problematic for countries with weaker currencies, since hotels will charge strong currency prices for their rooms, because tourists can afford it. Japan has this problem where hotels are too expensive for Japanese people because the Yen is weak compared to the Dollar and Euro, which is the currency hotels use to calculate their rates.
I understand that. But then tourism is a strong source of income. And it is one for Valencia already.
If you want to refuse it, then you need alternative sources of income. They do not arrive out of thin air, usually…
Spain actually has good job numbers right now (lowest unemployment since 2008) so it’s the perfect moment to try and limit shitty tourism sector jobs and try to steer growth into other sectors. Limit tourism, get higher unemployment but still relatively low compared to previous years, keep labor costs down, let other sectors hire workers and grow.
It is a strong source of income, for who?
Certainly not the citizens. Mostly property owners that don’t even live in the city.
Tourism is a source of income for citizens, not holiday rentals. A lot of people work in bars, restaurants, museums and all the other tourist attractions.
That being said, tourism is a shitty source of income as it mostly brings low paying jobs while extracting a lot of money to foreign investors. What most cities are trying to do is to push for less, more wealthy tourists instead of big numbers of poor tourists. People staying in holiday rentals spend less money than people staying in hotels so fighting those makes sense but needs to be done gradually and as part of some bigger plan.
Hotels aren’t more expensive than rentals. Hotels generate jobs, which rentals don’t. That’s why hotels are preferred. Hotels also don’t drive up house prices, because they’re purpose built.
Rich tourists don’t generate more revenue for locals than poorer tourists. In fact, poorer tourists might generate more money for locals because they’re more likely to shop in small businesses.
Either way, the biggest part of the income does not go to locals, but big corporations and owners.
Tourism also kills other businesses and sources of income, making a city even more dependent in more tourism. It makes everything more expensive too, so the cost of life increases, driving out locals.
Of course hotels are more expensive. Do you travel at all? Hotels don’t have kitchens which means you have to eat in restaurants all the time. This increases the cost of stay dramatically and brings a lot more jobs and money to local economy.
The main issue is zoning. You need a permit to open a hotel and cities make sure those are only open where there’s adequate transportation and that they don’t inconvenience residents. Holiday rentals open in residential areas that are not built to handle big number of tourists. Residents don’t want to share buildings with tourists because they are laud and destroy the property.
Rich tourists don’t generate more revenue for locals than poorer tourists. In fact, poorer tourists might generate more money for locals because they’re more likely to shop in small businesses.
What the size of business has to do with anything? A local Rolex store will have as many employees as local fridge magnet store. Rolex store needs way less customers to generate the same revenue and pay the same taxes and souvenir store. Rich tourists buy expensive things and bring more money. Poor tourists buy fake bags and hats form a street vendor that doesn’t pay any taxes at all.
When it come to revenue single rich tourist will bring more money than single poor tourist, obviously. Poor tourists only generate a lot of low paying jobs because you need a lot of them to make any real money. Cities are trying to bring more rich tourists to maintain the level of revenue and instead of creating low paying jobs serving poor tourists grow other sectors of economy.
I have actually travelled quite a bit, and I always prefer hotels both because they’re cheap and because they’re not as damaging to local communities. Hotels usually include breakfast, and for relatively cheap you can also eat and have dinner there. Even when taking into account the price of the food and restaurants, they mostly still end up being cheaper.
Holiday rentals open in residential areas that are not built to handle big number of tourists.
Tourists will fill up residential areas even if there are no hotels/apartments in them. Cities themselves are not made to cope with that amount of tourists.
Residents don’t want to share buildings with tourists because they are laud and destroy the property.
This is an issue, but the main issue with rentals is that they drive up the prices and push people away to suburbs.
What the size of business has to do with anything? A local Rolex store will have as many employees as local fridge magnet store.
Rolex is not a local company, and will take most of that money away from the local economy. Small shops can be owned by locals, so most of the money spent there stays in the local economy.
Poor tourists only generate a lot of low paying jobs because you need a lot of them to make any real money. Cities are trying to bring more rich tourists to maintain the level of revenue and instead of creating low paying jobs serving poor tourists grow other sectors of economy.
I’m pretty sure Rolex pays its employees the same as any other company. Probably close to minimum wage. Rolex doesn’t care about creating high paying jobs.
No tourist city I’ve ever lived in has ever worried about rich tourists. In fact, most people want them gone first.
Assuming you’re from USA, look at vail resorts in Colorado.
Unliveable for locals. And people who work there commute hours (as in more than 1 hour, maybe 2) one way to work.
Tourism can break local economy
I live in Spain and many places here have the exact same problem.
Which is a shame because I think Spain is a beautiful country, but visiting it always comes with that bitter aftertaste
I understand that
You don’t though.
People want to be happy where they grew up doing what they want to do.
I would imagine it’s the pain for locals where housing costs a fortune and the city becomes a ghost town out of season.
It’s Valencia.
