cheryl
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Is overtourism ruining your favorite vacation spot? - Exp Mag
Idyllic destinations worldwide are limiting vacation throngs so their golden goose isn't trampled to death.
Martha’s Vineyard, the island vacation spot off the Massachusetts coast, has a worldwide reputation as a bucolic retreat. But these days, the high season tourist crush brings gridlocked traffic that can make the place seem more like Times Square than a charming, rural escape. The old Vineyard “was almost like a secret … lovely, peaceful and not crowded at all,” resident Rose Styron recently told the Vineyard Gazette. “Until the Clintons came.”
For five summers during the 1990s, Bill, Hillary, and Chelsea Clinton vacationed on the island, drawing a surge in publicity and tourist interest. Two decades later, another American First Family, Barack Obama and his wife and daughters, visited the Vineyard often during his presidency. Today, amid the meandering bike paths, sun-kissed beaches, and quaint cottage-lined streets, the island is strained by soaring prices, housing shortages, and overburdened infrastructure. It’s a prominent American example of a major international problem: overtourism.
Idyllic destinations worldwide are limiting vacation throngs so their golden goose isn't trampled to death.
Martha’s Vineyard, the island vacation spot off the Massachusetts coast, has a worldwide reputation as a bucolic retreat. But these days, the high season tourist crush brings gridlocked traffic that can make the place seem more like Times Square than a charming, rural escape. The old Vineyard “was almost like a secret … lovely, peaceful and not crowded at all,” resident Rose Styron recently told the Vineyard Gazette. “Until the Clintons came.”
For five summers during the 1990s, Bill, Hillary, and Chelsea Clinton vacationed on the island, drawing a surge in publicity and tourist interest. Two decades later, another American First Family, Barack Obama and his wife and daughters, visited the Vineyard often during his presidency. Today, amid the meandering bike paths, sun-kissed beaches, and quaint cottage-lined streets, the island is strained by soaring prices, housing shortages, and overburdened infrastructure. It’s a prominent American example of a major international problem: overtourism.