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Barcelona will eliminate tourist apartments

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Re: Barcelona will eliminate tourist apartments

#341

Post by diggan »

Nasrudith wrote: post #333
zrn900 wrote: post #209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The math don't math. It's a drop in the bucket. The entire impact of AirBnB + all housing built in the last decade does not offset the last half decade of population growth. The population growth is largely due to rich foreigners moving into the city: "I was born and raised in Barcelona, no longer live there however. I didn't remember how bad it was until I went to visit my family last summer. Me and some friends w…

This furthers my thesis that anti-tourism is basically just a dogwhistle/socially acceptable channel for their xenophobia.

Is it xenophobia if the only people they have problem with is the ones who come for some days and behave like assholes, regardless of how they look?

I've lived here for more than a decade, I'm not native Catalan or Spanish and never experienced any xenophobia from anyone here.

Re: Barcelona will eliminate tourist apartments

#342

Post by zrn900 »

dang wrote: post #255
zrn900 wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's a short term authoritarian bandaid That's unintelligible. With that logic, every law and regulation is authoritarian. > all the while fostering resentment and opening up increasingly authoritarian measures in the future Here's the resentment: https://www.thestar.com.my/lifestyle/travel/2023/10/09/fed-u... And yes, the locals want more authoritarianism to keep away the overcrowding tourists, rich foreigners, an…

Please make your substantive points without swipes (like "that's unintelligible" and "people like you"). This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html . Edit: yikes, you've unfortunately been breaking the site guidelines repeatedly and badly—examples: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40743149 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40743095 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4074…

Under this post and in every single post you referenced, people are taking the largest swipes at entire countries, even peoples/races without any repercussions.

> please make sure you're not using HN primarily for political or ideological battle

All the threads you referenced are filled with people using the site in a political and ideological manner. There are people who are literally doing propaganda against entire countries and people.

> no, we don't care about your views

If you don't care about the views of the users, don't care about them in an egalitarian way. So far the rules seem to be getting applied selectively.

> We have to ban accounts that keep doing this

Feel free to do so. I'll get me coat myself. No need to contribute to a platform that not only does not care about its users' views but also applies its rules selectively and in an exceptionalist manner.

Re: Barcelona will eliminate tourist apartments

#343

Post by diggan »

hombre_fatal wrote: post #2

It's a short term authoritarian bandaid that doesn't even help that many people, all the while fostering resentment and opening up increasingly authoritarian measures in the future. We should go the asian route of increasing density and size. It's not like Barcelona is fully developed border to border.

> It's not like Barcelona is fully developed border to border

The city of Barcelona quite literally is fully developed border to border. Or where are you suggesting these new developments are gonna be made?

Re: Barcelona will eliminate tourist apartments

#344

Post by kachapopopow »

dnissley wrote: post #143
kachapopopow wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is that the "airbnb" areas drive normal citizens out which during off-seasons drains foot traffic making local shops go out of business which further complicates the problem. Not to mention that most tourists don't even sit around the local area, but rather go to the city attractions. Airbnb and resident housing areas are just not compatible, they have different needs and require different infrastructure. H…

Businesses are unable to plan around seasonality? What's up with that? In the US, businesses in touristy areas often will shut down for the slow season.

Huge difference between a local business supporting daily needs versus a tourist focused business. Not to mention different infrastructure.

Re: Barcelona will eliminate tourist apartments

#345

Post by kachapopopow »

jorvi wrote: post #165
kachapopopow wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is that the "airbnb" areas drive normal citizens out which during off-seasons drains foot traffic making local shops go out of business which further complicates the problem. Not to mention that most tourists don't even sit around the local area, but rather go to the city attractions. Airbnb and resident housing areas are just not compatible, they have different needs and require different infrastructure. H…

The problem with hotel rooms is that they’re more expensive, get much more expensive per additional person, and don’t have the amenities of an appartement. If I’m somewhere with a group for longer than three days, we want to be able to hang somewhere and cook our own food. The only other thing that offers this feature set is private rooms in hostels, and those are both rare and nearly always fully booked. I’m not say…

They also provide you with a lot of hidden features that you will take advantage of if something bad happens. None of that is offered by airbnb.

The reason why hotels are expensive is because they're properly regulated and are forced to be a net positive which is passed down to the customer. airbnbs had none of that until recently and all the negative impact was pocketed by the landlords.

Re: Barcelona will eliminate tourist apartments

#346

Post by cameronh90 »

jorvi wrote: post #165
kachapopopow wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is that the "airbnb" areas drive normal citizens out which during off-seasons drains foot traffic making local shops go out of business which further complicates the problem. Not to mention that most tourists don't even sit around the local area, but rather go to the city attractions. Airbnb and resident housing areas are just not compatible, they have different needs and require different infrastructure. H…

The problem with hotel rooms is that they’re more expensive, get much more expensive per additional person, and don’t have the amenities of an appartement. If I’m somewhere with a group for longer than three days, we want to be able to hang somewhere and cook our own food. The only other thing that offers this feature set is private rooms in hostels, and those are both rare and nearly always fully booked. I’m not say…

I’ve moved back to hotels exclusively after using airbnb for a long time.

Between the hosts and the platform itself, they just got too greedy with fees and extras. It ended up at the stage that hotels are both cheaper and provide a better experience.

Re: Barcelona will eliminate tourist apartments

#347

Post by permalac »

hombre_fatal wrote: post #2

It's a short term authoritarian bandaid that doesn't even help that many people, all the while fostering resentment and opening up increasingly authoritarian measures in the future. We should go the asian route of increasing density and size. It's not like Barcelona is fully developed border to border.

There is a democratic process on which tourists don't participate.

I think this working as it should.

Re: Barcelona will eliminate tourist apartments

#348

Post by chipdart »

diggan wrote: post #340
chipdart wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think it's fair to say I'm being dramatic by saying it's a drop in the bucket. I don't think it's dramatic. The whole anti-tourist arguments are based on, to put it charitably, politically-motivated specious reasoning. In this particular example, this whole argument is based on these assumptions: * making available each and every single one of those 15k houses for long-term rentals or sales instead of making them…

> * making available each and every single one of those 15k houses for long-term rentals or sales instead of making them available for short-term rentals would prevent or significantly attenuate the existing housing crisis, We can maybe both agree that doing something is better than doing nothing? Hopefully this is just one of the steps in a larger plan. Not a single thing will solve the current issues, but a combina…

> We can maybe both agree that doing something is better than doing nothing?

Yes, that's the whole point. Doing something clearly better than doing nothing.

Railing against short-term rentals does absolutely nothing to fix the problem.

That does not grant anyone the right of fabricating scapegoats that do nothing to solve the actual problem. This is exactly what's happening regarding short-term rentals.

Blaming short-term rentals for the lack of affordable housing is one of the stupidest and miopoc scapegoats that can ever be put together. Airbnb is not the reason why your neighbor rents the apartment. Airbnb is not attracting new tourists. Worst-case scenario, Airbnb eats away at the profit margins of industrial-grade hotels.

The lack of affordable housing is caused by the lack of real estate investment, urban renewal programs, and even social housing. If most want to buy an apartment but they can't afford one, that's a telltale sign of short supply. You only fix this problem by significantly increasing supply.

It's also a politically motivated scapegoat. Barcelona's previous mayor built her whole platform on that scapegoat. She could have implemented urban renewal programs to actually increase the number of homes available in the market, she could have implemented public transportation programs to bring mass transit to low-density areas to attract private investment, she could have created a municipal tax on short-term rental to finance social housing programs or even subsidized low-income rental programs, etc.

But no. She did absolutely nothing even though the railed frequently against short-term rentals. Because that's the point: fabricate a convenient scapegoat to direct and focus the anger of the electorate. But that same electorate is only mobilized as long as the housing problem prevails, and thus they do absolutely nothing to fix it.

> How is Hotel Arts or Hotel W examples of replacing whole residential buildings or city blocks?

They aren't. They are however massive real estate investment in prime locations in Barcelona which could just as easily be residential buildings that easily provided hundreds of homes.

Re: Barcelona will eliminate tourist apartments

#349

Post by chipdart »

atoav wrote: post #331
mapcars wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The tourism industry has a significant impact on Spain’s economy, generating over 70 billion euros in gross value added (GVA) in 2019. This represents a substantial contribution to the country’s GDP and employment, with over 2.5 million people employed in the tourism sector Well maybe you will just tell Spanish government how to replace that?

Having lived in two tourism-heavy cities over my life, I don't think most cites are fundamentally opposed to tourism per se. But — and that is a big "But" it is a question of the amount and the kind of tourism. Too much of the wrong tourism in the wrong area of the city can be a negative thing for living quality, for life outside touristic seasons, for the general development of neighborhoods etc. So it is within a c…

> Too much of the wrong tourism in the wrong area of the city can be a negative thing for living quality, for life outside touristic seasons, for the general development of neighborhoods etc.

If that was really a concern, cities like Barcelona would be railing against hostels and would impose a higher baseline for tourist taxes to eliminate the economic feasibility of projects catering to low-cost party tourism.

Re: Barcelona will eliminate tourist apartments

#350

Post by chipdart »

syspec wrote: post #211
kranke155 wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tourism is a shit industry. You could mostly annihilate it and replace it with productive things most of the time.

I know your comment is a "hot take", but the thing is about Tourism as an industry, is that the places where that /is/ the industry end up not gaining any other industries. So they become stuck as a "tourism" industry place

> I know your comment is a "hot take", but the thing is about Tourism as an industry, is that the places where that /is/ the industry end up not gaining any other industries.

This discussion is about Barcelona.

Barcelona is one of the richest regions in Europe. It's hardly a third-world hellhole or a banana republic.

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