According to a study by Munich-based holiday rentals agency Holidu, Palma doesn't rank among the top ten cities in Europe most overcrowded because of tourists.
The study, based on 2019 figures for tourist numbers, compared these with city populations. At the top of the list was Dubrovnik. The population was 41,671, while the number of tourists was 1.5 million, a ratio of 36 to one, well ahead of Venice with 21.3 to one.
Third was Bruges (21.1), followed by Rhodes (20.9) and Reykjavik. The rest of the top ten, in order, comprised Florence, Heraklion, Amsterdam, Dublin and Tallinn; this last city had a ratio of 9.6.
A point to be made about this study concerns population sizes and what population is actually being measured - city or metropolitan area. Reported population statistics for individual cities do tend to vary, but there is a case for saying that Palma's city population would be third highest among the ten mentioned; there would be a different picture when it comes to metropolitan areas.
Holidu doesn't give a figure for Palma, but another study (based on 2022 figures) by the European University in Madrid calculated that the number of foreign tourists was 3.1 million. While this did exclude Spanish tourists, the 3.1 million would give a ratio of 7.5 tourists for every resident; Palma's population (2022) was 415,940.
It is possible that 'saturation' in Palma has now been reduced because of the limit on cruise ships. But regardless of figures that may be produced, there is always the perception of saturation, which is arguably just as important.
4 comments
To be able to write a comment, you have to be registered and logged in
In terms of saturation, the far more damning figure is the number of ‘day’ visitors. A small mention in Andrew’s article - is that saturation in Palma has been limited by the current restriction on cruise ships. Great! Not great is the new government’s ‘rumblings’ that this cruise ship number limitation might not be long term.In fact they may well abandon it altogether. If this happens, watch out Palma. Saturation will reach crisis point. High value tourists will run for the hills (quite literally) and locals will be left in total dismay.
Marvin, I think you might find that the average Spaniard has much less physical presence than your average obese tatooed Brit.
A seriously flawed survey. If you aren’t including some tourists because of their nationality (ie Spanish tourists) then your data is worthless. Why? If it’s saturation you’re looking at then the key metric is physical presence. The last time I checked a Spaniard has just as much physical presence as anyone else!
If one relates the number of tourists to the number of inhabitants intra muros, it looks a bit different. In the old own centre, which is quite large, there is no way to escape tourists more than 1 meter of distance. Tourist overcrowding does not count against citizens of Son Gotleo or Son Canals.