Amsterdam suffers from tourism indigestion. At least the so-called mass tourism. While in other European cities with a significant predominance in the service sector (including Spain’s top destinations) each new visitation record is celebrated as an economic success, in the Dutch capital their focus has shifted.

The aim here is no longer to attract more tourism, but to stop tourism and harmonize it with the lives of its neighbors. To that end, authorities have imposed a limit on overnight stays, banned cruise ships, and even launched a campaign to remove visitors seeking sex and drugs.

Now the city has decided to go one step further and put the brakes on its sector. Like? Ban on new hotel construction. For each one that opens, another must close. And in no case may the balance of places increase.

No more hotels, thank you. That’s exactly what the Amsterdam City Council is doing. And definitely. On Thursday, he issued a statement declaring that he was vetoing the construction of new accommodation facilities and insisting on his desire to stop mass tourism. “Amsterdam says ‘no’ to new hotels. We want the city to remain livable for both residents and visitors. This means: no to overtourism, no to new hotels and no more than 20 million hotel nights a year. A fraction of tourists a year,” he emphasizes.

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So what does this translate into? From now on, every businessman or chain that wants to open a hotel in the city will have a very difficult time. To start your business, you must first close another business. And the number of beds may not increase in any case. New businesses also need to be “better” than their predecessors, meaning “more modern or sustainable” facilities.

As if the above wasn’t enough, the Dutch capital’s City Council even issues advice for those looking to open a business in the city: “We encourage hoteliers to choose a location outside the city centre.”

(Even harder. The guide does nothing but make mass tourism (even) difficult. By now, the city was already implementing a “strict hotel policy,” as the City Council recalled, which explains why there were only three proposals that met the conditions in 2017. Officials said, “However, there are still hotels under construction and new ones are being added.” The authorities admit, assuring that “26 initiatives are ongoing.” For this reason, the municipality decided to end the construction of new accommodation facilities; This measure will not affect the permits granted so far.

Tourism is better with a roof. The huge influx of tourists to Amsterdam and its impact on the city’s daily life led him to take a strange step: setting a limit for himself. While authorities in other major European destinations boast about each new tourist registration and reveal the sector’s turnover figures, the discourse is different in the Dutch capital.

There they decided to put a ceiling on the flow of visitors. The measure is not new. It has been talked about for years. But the City Council used its new veto to remember this: The city aims not to exceed 20 million nights of stays.

“The 20 million overnight stay limit comes from the popular initiative ‘Amsterdam has a choice’. 30 thousand city residents wanted to control the flow of visitors. The municipality determined by regulation that the number of tourists staying overnight should not be exceeded. The City Council recalls: “In 2023, hotel per night The number of accommodations, excluding holiday rentals, reached 20 million 665 thousand, bed and breakfast and staying on cruise ships.

“Limit growth”. The quotation marks are once again taken from the municipality of Amsterdam, which explains on its official website how it has introduced a series of measures for this purpose: to stop the growth and “troubles” of the sector.

His recipe includes initiatives such as “combatting” hen parties that cause disturbances and pub crawls, “restricting” the movement of river cruises, redistributing tourism around the city to ensure it is organized in a “more uniform” way, converting houses into hotels. and bans marijuana consumption in offices and brings up the closure of bars and clubs.

When you reach the top. “In June 2021, the City Council approved a new tourism policy, ‘Tourism in Balance’. The plan determines the maximum number of overnight stays and one-day visits per tourist.” Speaking on its website, the City Council states that “a maximum of 20 million visitors per year” – not overnight stays – and that measures will be taken if the 18 million limit is exceeded. Local authorities even go further, deploring the existence of companies that “abuse the city’s image” and give the message that “everything is allowed.”

The problem of tourist saturation and the complex balance between tourist success and local people’s lives is not unique to Amsterdam. Tomorrow the Canary Islands will host a demonstration against overcrowding with the slogan “there is a limit” to the island territory. The ‘Tourism Perception 2023’ report presented by the City Council in Barcelona, ​​another major national destination, reveals the following: 61.5 percent of residents believe the city has reached its limit. It is also forbidden to open hotels in the center of Barcelona.

Question about numbers. Whether they are attracted by this image of freedom or by its landscapes, heritage and history, the truth is that Amsterdam is flooded with tourists every year. They are so numerous that they far exceed their local population. Between 800,000 and 900,000 people live in the capital, but it attracts millions of tourists every year. Statista guarantees that in 2022, its hotels recorded five million international arrivals, with Germany leading the way and 1.6 million national arrivals recorded. ITB Berlin talks about more than 22 million visitors in 2019 alone.

The City Council guarantees that in 2023 the number of stays will exceed 20.6 million nights, excluding those registered outside hotels. Statista estimates the city had about 81,300 hotel beds in 2019, 4,450 more than a year earlier. This offer is also added to the offer available on Airbnb.

What journeys, what excesses. The hotel ban is not the first measure implemented by local authorities. Last year they agreed to restrict the docking of large cruise ships and were even considering closing the central terminal, a move that would hit the cruise industry hard. Months ago, the city also launched an unorthodox tourism campaign that directly, without taking any precautions, asked a certain profile of visitors to stay away.

The main slogan of the initiative, which focuses mainly on the British public and is described as “discriminatory” by some businesses in the tourism sector, is “Coming to Amsterdam for a wild night? Stay away.”

Image | Franklin Heijnen (Flickr)

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