Thousands of people took to the streets of southern European cities on Sunday to protest against excessive tourism, firing water guns at shop windows and lighting flares in Barcelona, where the main protest took place.
"Holidays for you, misery for me," chanted protesters on the streets of Barcelona, holding banners with inscriptions such as "mass tourism is killing the city" and "their greed is bringing us ruin."
Protesters from the activist coalition Southern Europe Against Overtourism (SET) joined forces with groups from Portugal and Italy, arguing that uncontrolled tourism is causing skyrocketing property prices and forcing people to leave their homes.
Barcelona, a city of 1,6 million inhabitants, attracted 26 million tourists last year.
Authorities in the northeastern Spanish city said about 600 people joined the demonstration, some firing water guns and lighting flares and pasting stickers saying "tourists go home" on shop and hotel windows.
Similar protests were held in other parts of Spain, including Ibiza, Malaga, Palma de Mallorca, San Sebastian and Granada. Protests in Italy were held in cities including Genoa, Naples, Palermo, Milan and Venice, where local residents are opposing the construction of two hotels that will add about 1500 new beds to the city, organizers said.
In Barcelona, the city government announced last year that it would ban the rental of apartments to tourists by 2028 in order to make the city more livable for residents.
"I'm very tired of being a nuisance in my own city. The solution is to propose a radical reduction in the number of tourists in Barcelona and rely on another economic model that brings prosperity to the city," said 38-year-old Eva Vilaseca at Sunday's protests in Barcelona, rejecting the common counterargument that tourism brings jobs and prosperity.
International travel spending in Europe is expected to rise 11 percent to $838 billion this year, with Spain and France among the countries set to receive record numbers of tourists.
A protest in Lisbon is scheduled for later Sunday afternoon.
Photo: EPA/QUIQUE GARCIA
