Organisers of the protest Mallorca Platja Tour have been posting images of the protest on social media and the demonstrations has attracted a great deal of interest from local, national and international media with numerous camera crews on the beach which leads on to Es Trenc, once considered one of the most beautiful beaches in Europe. Protest group Mallorca Platja Tour took to social media earlier this week, posting on X, formerly Twitter: “We urge residents to fill the beaches of Mallorca as a demonstration against overcrowding.”
Ever since last Saturday’s 10,000-strong demonstration through Palma, the British and international media has been full of reports about the protest and its potential impact on the island’s tourist industry and journalists are on the island trying to get to the bottom of what is an extremely complex issue.
The protest comes just days after new measures suggested by the Mayor of Palma Jaime Martinez on Thursday to try to tackle the impact of mass tourism were voted down by the city council. They included limiting the number of cruise ships allowed to dock in Palma, banning the biggest vessels, imposing new taxes on passengers when they disembark, restricting the number of rental cars that can enter the city at a time, and limiting or banning party boats and booze cruises.
Martínez said: “We will continue fighting for the interests of citizens and for coexistence between residents and tourists. This is a global problem for Spain and we will decide how to solve this problem.”
“We will not resign ourselves” was response to the words of the extreme right Vox councillor in Parliament, Manuela Cañadas, in which she questioned whether Mallorcans wanted to go to the beaches in summer “peacefully”. Rosa Marsillí, one of the voices behind the proposal, explained the meaning of this initiative, which will be continued. “We have the same rights as tourists. We can’t just sit back and do nothing”, she explained.
The participants carried out a performance in which they simulated the situation “that those of us who live here live all summer, we don’t even have five centimetres to put our towel on”. Piled up on the same towel, they staged this typical summer beach scene in an act that was both festive and protesting. This morning’s meeting in Campos was the first, but a new demonstration is expected to take place on 16 June. “We have no further expectations, the only objective is to echo the situation suffered by Mallorcans and residents,” said the organisation. “We just want to raise awareness and that this summer, we can visit our beaches as we have always done”. With the hashtag #OcupemLesNostresPlatges, they will continue to claim the cause on social networks, where the initiative was born.
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RickYou know I think your right. As a 40 years of 25 days split , a couple of time a year visitor to the island I breeze through the airport to a car and arrive on the west coast. Comment on the ever increasing traffic and new roads . Have a good time pack and return. Talking to the locals and they said 20 years ago how expensive the island is , 10 to 20 % was the figure then. Now I have no idea how the young’uns can afford a home on typical wages . As working conditions certainly hasn’t changed that much . Disconnect and discontent build up over time and people lash out for change and protest against a target. In the U.K. it was Brexit. In tourism hotspots it’s tourism. The political classes need to listen, much criticism of people who’s community was changed in the U.K. saying they were parochial and lacked tolerance because they valued family, place and community . I see similarities here .
Chris GPrivate lets are very strictly regulated here. In fact, you can no longer get a licence to operate one. There's some operating illegally, but the estimated numbers of those varies from a few hundred to a few hundred thousand, depending on the political bent of the person offering their opinion. And enforcement is apparently dysfunctional for some reason... In other words, nobody really knows how many are operating illegally (and Airbnb isn't the only platform), but it simply cannot be in the hundreds of thousands that some politicians or media claim, and overall, it's still a fraction of a fraction of a fraction of the number of hotel rooms. And in the case of fincas and villas, they attract a more desirable type of tourist anyway. So, if you want to control the pigeon population, trapping frogs isn't going to help much. Maybe more effective to aim first before pulling the trigger?
Chris GBeg to differ, a lot of them actually are. Jumping on the bandwagon and protest because others do and generally things aren’t great in their lives. Tourists visiting are symptoms of the system and infrastructure their own precious local neighbors and municipalities and politicians have created over decades. Barking up the wrong trees I say.
I am very sympathetic to the plight of the locals who are priced out of housing, but this is not only a problem in tourist areas, there is the same issue throughout the UK. As for locals and access to the beaches, I grew up in Torquay in Devon, we didn’t go to the beach during summer, or if we did, we went to the less well known beaches away from the crowds of ‘grockles’. You can’t have the penny and the bun! Either you want the 45% of GDP mass tourism brings or you don’t although proliferation of unregulated accommodation should be curtailed.
Chris GOk you're entitled to your opinion, but it still has nothing to do with overcrowding, and in fact, is precisely the type of tourist that everybody wants, as opposed to the mass tourism of the hotels.
Morgan WilliamsAirbnb may indeed not be the biggest driver to the issues, but it must surely contribute to the overall problem of excessive numbers of tourists in every corner of this island. There are strict rules about all tourist beds on the island, but somehow Airbnb think they are above the law. Nobody wants apartments in their building to become Airbnb lets, with people dragging suitcases up and down the stairs constantly at all hours of day and night. Airbnb should be regulated just as strictly as all other tourist beds. Without strict regulation of all tourist beds the government has zero control over the number of tourists.
John PittsMaybe. But it is about 20 people protesting about overcrowding on an otherwise empty beach. The optics don't really support the narrative. As I've said all along, it's a noisy minority. Noise often is the catalyst for widespread adoption of a cause. But that doesn't make it real. It's just noise. Still, many people will buy it, even if there's little or no evidence to support it, or if the issue is far more complex than stated. Especially If you're British, you should know this consequence by now.
Duncan WattsYou or they may not be aware of it, but Airbnb isn't even remotely the cause of any perceived or actual over-tourism in Mallorca. To do this would be tantamount to banning restaurants because tourists go there. Yeah, ok, let's force rents to be so cheap that anybody anywhere will be clamouring to get one, and owners will take them off the market because It's better to keep them empty. Do these people even think about anything? This is getting absurd.
Morgan Williamsin fairness, aside from the headline, that’s a very informative and well balanced article. MB take note?!
Easy: 1. The the cruise ships visiting, 2. Control the amount of landing slots at the airport. 3. Instead of lying on the beach, why don't they themselves check the records to see who owns more than one apartment. Then click onto Airbnb to see if they are visible with no licence, then snitch on them to the council or set up a Blacklist on FB so that the council can take action.