Two Places, Two Problems

By Charles Houston

The vet and I were chatting as she gave our horses their spring shots. I mentioned that my wife and I were shortly leaving for a vacation in Austria. When the vet heard that, she exclaimed, “You have to see Hallstatt! You absolutely must!”

I believed her and marked it boldly on my Michelin map.

Overtourism—Hallstatt

The vet was right. Hallstatt may well be the prettiest village on earth. I’ve seen many lists from travel magazines that deem it so. I updated our travel map accordingly.

I’ll try to describe the place, but please, please Google “Hallstatt” and hit “Images.” You’ll see many views of the fairytale village, all of them enchanting. You will see tall alps surrounding a pretty mountain lake, the Halstattersee, and the village clinging to a ledge where the towering Dachstein massif meets the lake. Elegant swans glide gracefully near the shore, waiting for someone to toss them a treat.

The village has a number of primitive log houses, ancients amongst its centuries-old Alpine houses. Window flower boxes flush with red geraniums are everywhere. Hallstatt’s origins go back to the Iron Age and salt mining. (Salt was important in preserving meats.) 

It has prospered from a robust tourism economy, but that’s finally gotten way out of hand, especially due to mass tour groups from China. A few years ago, the town reduced the number of buses by about a third. That was not enough and today the 800-person village still sees ten thousand visitors daily. The village has just banned any buses after five but it’s still crowded in tourist season.

Here’s a measure of Hallstatt’s appeal: In its Guangdong Province, China just built a full-scale replica of the Austrian village; it’s shockingly accurate.

Venice

The city of canals has been overrun: St. Mark’s Square can be so crowded that one could walk across it on the shoulders of tourists. The city first reacted to one aesthetic nightmare: Gigantic cruise ships moored in Venice’s eponymous harbor, dwarfing the Ducal palace and the Campanile tower.

Venice now limits the number of cruise ships. 

Barcelona

This fabled Spanish city has increased its tax on tourists by about one Euro a day. The new tax revenue is supposed to increase the aggregate revenue from tourism while lessening the visitor onslaught. 

Locals don’t seem convinced. They still protest and enjoy using their water hoses to douse tourists.

Amsterdam

The home of Rembrandt and weed has faced up to its overtourism with a comprehensive approach: Increasing the tourist tax. Reducing cruise ship annual arrivals from 190 to 100. Reducing and then prohibiting new hotel rooms. Banning new tourist shops. Using other measures to reduce the number of problematic tourists, which I suspect relates to group tourism or to rowdy young people.

Sintra

This is a fantasyland of over-the-top palaces, about 30 km from Lisbon. It was a country getaway for royalty and the wealthy, all of whom built with extravagance and grandiosity. Most notable is the candy-cake Pena Palace, which I suggest Googling.

Locals are protesting. A welcoming graffito in Sintra proclaims, “Tourism is Terrorism.”

 Data Centers—Commonalities

Those places need some tourist dollars, but they are also trying to avoid the deterioration of their culture. One thrust is fiscal—increase the costs to tourists. Another technique is legally banning or mandating various aspects of overtourism, like the number of permitted cruise ships.

All want some level of tourism to remain but the citizenry appears to demand more relief. 

One Meaningful Indicium

Can overtourism be quantified? One metric could be the number of visitors divided by the number of residents, but I don’t think it would work: little Hallstatt sees 4,500 visitors per citizen, while that ratio is closer to ten-to-one in the larger cities. That statistic is out of whack, and not meaningful. 

There is one indicator, a very meaningful one, which warns of too many data centers: their power requirements. You’d have to be a troglodyte not to be aware that existing data center power demands have pushed us to the edge of a cliff, and the power demands of additional data centers and AI would give us a quick shove into the abyss.

Can you say “huge transmission lines?” How about “power outages?” Maybe even “blackouts?” How about “ugly,” “too big,” and “overwhelming?” Regardless of any quantitative measurements, the most important concern is citizens’ perception that data centers lead to the deterioration of Loudoun’s culture. Remember that people vote on their perception of things, not by following some statistic or algorithm.

Then What?

First off, the County is swimming in cash from the data centers that are open now (and spending that money willy-nilly.) Next, those European cities are just nibbling at their overtourism problem, and nibbling around the edges will not be enough for Loudoun.

Boldness is required, as is courage in these litigious times. Proclaim “Enough!” and slam the door on any new data centers, grandfathering only those projects with actual construction underway. Submitting plans to the County or performing sitework shouldn’t count as “construction.”  Land speculators and the data center industry will squawk and certainly sue the County, which should declare an emergency, stand firm and fight.

By The Way …

I’ve read that the County will take two years to state its preference for locating new transmission lines. That’s sclerotic. Times demand action.

Charles Houston developed many corporate office buildings and even the biggest of them, at 1.2 million square feet, took less than two years to build. He believes that two years to plan something is ridiculous.