Featured Image Credit: Pixabay
Topics: Travel, World News
Joe Harker
A much-loved holiday spot in Europe has taken the rather dramatic step of banning new hotels from springing up around the place.
If I described to you a place in Spain by the seaside with lovely summer weather then you'd probably reckon it was a veritable paradise which you'd love to visit.
Tourism is normally a pretty good deal for most places in the world as they rock up with the goal of spending lots of money.
Plenty of parts of the world do a lot to attract tourists as certain businesses depend on them, though in recent times some places have changed their tune a bit.
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Several cities across Europe have introduced a 'tourist tax' to directly raise money from those who would come to visit, while some spots have gone even further in being a little bit tougher on tourists.
A popular tourist hotspot in Spain decided to introduce measures to make their local area more 'breathable' after receiving over 200,000 tourists a year.
It's not that these places don't like tourists, they do, it's just that some visitors aren't always on their best behaviour and these places want to strike a balance between catering to tourists and making sure the locals get to enjoy the place as well.
With that in mind, the Spanish town of San Sebastian which plays host to hundreds of thousands of tourists each year has announced a crackdown on new hotels being built.
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Existing hotels in the town are fine and dandy, but a new rule bans attempts to build more and properties can't be turned into Airbnbs, though existing ones will be allowed to remain.
The goal here is for more sustainable tourism, so limiting the number of tourists coming to San Sebastian with a view to improving things for local residents is the idea.
Some spots of the coastal Spanish town have seen anti-tourist graffiti appear, while a report on the impact of tourism found that it had negatively impacted the local food and culture.
Meanwhile, in Mallorca this summer the police cracked down on bad behaviour by handing out harsh fines to those breaking the rules.
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There was also a limit on the amount of alcohol a person could buy in the hopes of lowering public drunkenness.
Meanwhile, young Brits were recently told to 'stay away' from Amsterdam as part of a new campaign which changed the rules around weed, alcohol and brothels.