Falling

Domestic
Fares and an
A.I. Arms
Race: What
Travelers
Can Expect
in 2024
At the start of what promises to
be a very busy year, we look
ahead at what you’re likely to
encounter.

Published Jan. 18, 2024

Last year, after mandatory coronavirus restrictions were lifted around the world,
international tourism recovered to 90 percent of prepandemic levels, according to
the World Tourism Organization.

But it was also a year of upheavals, with disasters — both natural and man-made —
disrupting travel, from wildfires to labor unrest and technological breakdowns.

With 2023 in the rearview mirror, we look ahead at what travelers will face in 2024.

1. Airline Prices: Will They Finally Drop?

A record 4.7 billion passengers are expected to fly globally in 2024, up from the
previous record of 4.5 billion in 2019, according to the International Air Transport
Association. Analysts at American Express Global Business Travel say that average
ticket prices across all regions are not expected to change significantly. But in the United
States, domestic and international airfares are expected to move in opposite directions.

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 Credit...Chanelle Nibbelink

Hayley Berg, lead economist for the booking platform Hopper, anticipates that for the
next six months, domestic airfare will cost less than in 2023 and prepandemic years.
Travelers booking domestic flights in February can expect to pay an average fare of
about $276 round-trip — an 8 percent decrease from the same month last year. Reasons
for the falling prices include increased airplane capacity — the number of seats on a
given route — and a drop in the cost of jet fuel.

“January will be the cheapest month of the year to book travel until the fall shoulder
season in September and October,” Ms. Berg said. “Airfare will rise into late spring as
the spring break and summer travel period heat up.”

International airfare departing from the United States is up 10 percent for 2024
compared with 2023, according to Kayak, a travel search engine. But airline capacity,
Ms. Berg said, is rising and might eventually dampen that increase in prices.

Overall, the outlook for airfare this year is a return to normalcy, said the aviation analyst
Robert W. Mann Jr.

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“Revenge travel” and the volatility in airfare that has characterized the last few years
are “basically in the rearview mirror,” he said. And ebbing demand for leisure travel
might mean more excess capacity, further driving prices down.

— Christine Chung

2. A.I.: Will It Change My Vacation?

It is hard to believe that it has only been about a year since travelers started dabbling in
ChatGPT-created itineraries. This year will bring even more experimentation and
innovation. “A.I. is like a teenage intern,” said Chad Burt, co-owner of the travel adviser
network Outside Agents, “better, smarter, faster than you, but you need to lead them.”

The expanding use of A.I. could influence how we book online, what happens when
flights are canceled or delayed, and even how much we pay for tickets.

“In 2024, we will see a new breed of intelligent travel agents built on top of chatbots,”
said Oren Etzioni, professor emeritus of computer science at the University of
Washington. That means travelers will begin interacting with sites like Airbnb, Expedia
and Priceline by typing out questions in addition to ticking boxes to search for lodging,
restaurants and amenities like swimming pools.

A.I. will also power what happens behind the scenes at airlines and airports, said Gilbert
Ott, director of partnerships at Point.me, which helps travelers find flights to buy with
rewards points. For example, it could improve automatic rebooking onto new flights
when customers miss connections or weather snarls runways. At United Airlines, for
example, smarter software can offer rebooking options and issue food and lodging
vouchers when a flight is canceled, rather than just rebooking a flight.

On the ground, A.I. software will be able to inform more human-made decisions, like
how to most efficiently reposition baggage carts and staff in response to tight
connections or flight delays.

Finally, A.I. systems trained on bigger and more up-to-date data sets will let airlines’
dynamic ticket-pricing algorithms better use data like weather predictions and
customers’ searches to charge as much as they can while still filling planes. At the same
time, companies like the online travel agency Hopper, which says it uses 70 trillion data
points in its pricing prediction model, continue to work the problem from the other side,
in a kind of A.I.-powered arms race between the airlines and customers.

— Julie Weed

3. Biometrics: Will They Replace My Passport?

In the year ahead, the use of biometrics — an individual’s unique physical identifiers,
such as fingerprints and faces — will be expanded at airports in the United States and
abroad, a shift to enhance security, replace physical identification such as passports and

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driver’s licenses, and reduce the amount of time required by travelers to pass through
airports. Biometric technology will be seen everywhere from bag drops at the check-in
counters to domestic security screening.

In the United States, the Transportation Security Administration is expanding

its program allowing passengers to opt in for a security screening relying on a facial
recognition match with their physical identification — a photo taken in real time is
compared against a scan of a license or passport and assists the T.S.A. officer in verifying
a traveler’s identity. This program is currently available at 30 airports nationwide,
including Salt Lake City International Airport and Denver International Airport; the
T.S.A. said it will expand to more than 400 airports in the coming years.

T.S.A. PreCheck travelers who are flying on Delta Air Lines may not even need to show
their identification at all during bag drop and security, if they opt in to Delta’s digital
ID program.

The program, which compares a photo taken at the airport to one in a database
of trusted travelers (compiled by the U.S. Customs and Border Protection agency), takes
about 40 seconds, said Greg Forbes, Delta’s managing director of airport experience.
The pilot program is now available at five airports, including La Guardia Airport and Los
Angeles International Airport.

Internationally, Singapore’s Changi Airport plans to adopt facial recognition technology

for departing passengers, no longer requiring them to show their passports.

Neville Pattinson, head of North America business development for biometrics for
Thales, a global technology company, said travelers will start to get increasingly familiar
with using biometrics.

“We see much less interaction needed by the traveler, making it less stressful and more
seamless,” Mr. Pattinson said. “We’re seeing biometrics really help the travel industry
cope with the volumes of travelers going up and the need to really process people
quicker.”

— Christine Chung

4. Destinations: What’s Hot This Year?

London, Rome, Tokyo, Cancún and Las Vegas, some of the most visited destinations in
2023, are still among the top places travelers are searching to go to this year, according
to the travel sites Kayak and Hopper.

Beach destinations like the Cayman Islands and French Polynesia are also trending
destinations for 2024.

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 Credit...Chanelle Nibbelink

“Americans are looking for fun in the sun,” said Laura Lindsay, a global travel trends
expert at the travel search engine Skyscanner. “Our data shows that they are seeking out
destinations with equal opportunities for relaxation and outdoor adventures.”

After the extreme weather events of 2023 and overcrowding at popular destinations,
travelers are also looking for cooler, less crowded spots.

Those hoping to avoid the kind of crippling heat that struck southern Europe last
summer are showing interest in Scandinavian countries like Norway and Denmark, say
travel advisers, and airlines like Air Canada and American Airlines are adding new
routes to meet the demand.

“Two of my favorite places in the region are Bergen and Flam in Norway, with some
amazing food, markets and landscapes,” said Joshua Smith, the founder of Global Citizen
Journeys, a travel company that caters to millennials.

While interest in Scandinavia is rising, Mr. Smith said the priority for most of his clients
is to book major destinations like Italy and France while there are still accommodations.
Once places are sold out, he expects rapid growth in Scandinavia bookings.

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Mr. Smith is also recommending Malta. “From its history and architecture to the food,
Malta maintains the comfort of Europe with solid tourism infrastructure, but without
the crowds.”

Another alternative that travel advisers recommend is Slovenia. “Because it’s less
known, it is much cheaper and less crowded,” said Laurel Brunvoll, the owner
of Unforgettable Trips, a Maryland-based travel agency.

While Ms. Brunvoll’s clients are eyeing destinations off the beaten path, they are also
booking popular places like Italy, Spain, Portugal, France and Britain. More distant
destinations, including Egypt and India, are also gaining traction as well as polar
excursions and world cruises, she said.

In North America, one of the most anticipated events is the total solar eclipse on April 8.
Popular places to view the path of totality include the Mazatlán coast of Mexico; Cape
Girardeau, Mo., with its hiking trails, bike paths and nature center; and scenic Niagara
Falls, N.Y.

Texas is also expected to be an epicenter for the event and, with its range of scenery,
festivals and other activities in places like Burnet, Sulphur Springs and Lampasas, could
draw up to 700,000 visitors, according to the eclipse cartographer Michael Zeiler, who
has been keeping track of visitation probability in various areas.

— Ceylan Yeginsu

5. Hotels: Will They Finally Beat Rentals?

In cities from New York to Vienna, new short-term-rental restrictions — designed to
improve housing availability for residents — are poised to boost the bottom lines at
hotels. In New York in November, shortly after Airbnb and the like were limited to stays
of 30 days or longer, hotel occupancy was up 6 percent and rates were up 8 percent,
according to the commercial real estate firm CoStar.

However, travelers working remotely continue to favor rentals, which remain strong
in rural areas where there are more rentals than hotels.

“We’ve seen the strongest demand in small and midsize cities, coastal and mountain
locations and areas outside of major urban centers,” said Jamie Lane, the senior vice
president of analytics and chief economist at AirDNA, a market research firm that
specializes in short-term rentals. “Hotel supply is primarily in larger urban centers or
along interstates,” he added.

Though rentals are expected to account for just over 15 percent of lodging demand in
2024, compared to about 12 percent before the pandemic, they have profoundly
challenged hotels. In response, hotels have adopted more residential features.

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“Hotels have taken a page from the short-term-rental playbook and said, ‘We want our
restaurants open to the public and we want rooms not to be beige boxes,’” said Jan
Freitag, the national director for hospitality analytics at CoStar. “On the amenities side,
the room that used to be a place to crash now has to serve as an office.”

With features such as kitchenettes and expanded living spaces, extended-stay hotels are
booming. New brands expected to debut this year include MidX Studios from
Marriott, LivSmart Studios by Hilton and Hyatt Studios.

“We’ve never seen ourselves as in competition with hotels,” said David Whiteside, the
global chief operating officer at Onefinestay, which rents high-end homes and
apartments with concierge service. It was acquired by Accor Hotels in 2016. “There will
be times when a hotel is the perfect fit for a family or individual, and times when a
home, villa or chalet would be the better option.”

Meanwhile, hotels are leaning into what distinguishes them most: the human element.

Makarand Mody, an associate professor of hospitality marketing at Boston University,

noted that “certain travelers appreciate the service of hotels, which is where they
outshine rentals.”

— Elaine Glusac

6. Points: Should I Use Them?

The question of whether to save or to spend miles takes on new urgency this year as
lawmakers consider the Credit Card Competition Act. The legislation targets transaction
fees — usually 2 to 3 percent of a sale — that retailers pay to credit card companies
such as Visa and Mastercard. The fees are partially used by the companies to run loyalty
programs that award points to cardholders that can be redeemed for things like flights
and hotels.

The act proposes allowing retailers to choose a cheaper system that would reduce the
fees. Critics, including banks and airlines, which make billions selling co-branded credit
cards, maintain that a cheaper system, backed by retail giants like Walmart and Target,
would upend rewards programs.

Whether the legislation will succeed is unknown.

“This has been one of the biggest lobbying battles of all time, pitting two huge
industries, retail versus banking,” said Brian Kelly, the founder of the Points Guy, a
travel site that helps users maximize reward points and opposes the act.

Does the legislation threaten your points? Not immediately, said Leigh Rowan of Savanti
Travel, a personal travel management service. “Assuming it passes, we still have a long
runway ahead between then and when the bill will be enacted,” he said. “There’s not a
rush to do anything in 2024.”

Still, experts perennially advise spending over saving points.

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“Never hoard,” said Mr. Kelly, explaining that airlines and hotels have the leeway to
change their redemption values overnight, and to keep up with the growth of points,
they tend to increase the total needed to get a flight or hotel room. “Over time, the
points you have today generally lose value.”

Mr. Rowan suggests diversifying your credit cards by switching from one airline card,
for example, where you can only redeem points with that airline, to a more robust card
like the Chase Sapphire Preferred card that has redemption partnerships with multiple
airlines, hotels and rental car companies.

“Diversification will help regardless, but especially if this act goes through,” Mr. Rowan
said.

— Elaine Glusac

7. Trains: Should I Travel by Rail?

Credit...Chanelle Nibbelink

Train lovers and travelers concerned about their carbon footprint have a lot to choose
from this year — especially in Europe. While some European governments are
mulling short-haul flight bans, many passengers are already opting for rail, where new
connections are numerous.

Nightjet, part of the Austrian federal railway, ÖBB, started running a sleeper train
between Berlin and Paris in December, while the French rail operator, S.N.C.F., started
overnight service between Paris and Aurillac, in south-central France, the same month.
Sleeper trains between Paris and Vienna and Paris and Nice are also already in service.

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And the Italian rail operator Trenitalia has recently started running a weekly high-speed
connection between Rome and the station serving the Pompeii archaeological park.

Other new European connections include a sleeper service between Brussels and
Prague, coming in late March, and an overnight train between Brussels and Bratislava,
Slovakia, expected late this year or early next. Trenitalia is also working on high-speed
service between Paris and Barcelona, with a possible connection to Madrid, as well as a
direct link between Milan and Ljubljana, Slovenia; no start date has been set for either
service.

Looking for a luxury experience? The Orient Express La Dolce Vita will offer itineraries
through Italy beginning in November. Backed by the French conglomerate Accor, the
service will emphasize design and fine dining, and will take visitors to places like
Palermo, Portofino, Rome and Siena.

Asia-bound travelers also have luxury options with two new itineraries on the Eastern
& Oriental Express. Each route starts and ends in Singapore and takes travelers on a
three-night trip through Malaysia. In March, Japan will offer extended bullet train
service from Tokyo to Fukui prefecture, home to a 13th-century Buddhist temple,
coastal cliffs and a dinosaur museum.

In the United States, Amtrak’s new fleet of high-speed trains could soon enter service in
the Northeast Corridor, although no start date has been set. The trains will reach 160
miles per hour, up from the current 150 m.p.h.

As of last month, Brightline — a privately owned intercity operator — has been

running 16 round-trip trains every day between Orlando, Fla., and Miami. Looking
ahead, Brightline is planning a high-speed route between Las Vegas and Los Angeles, a
project that won $3 billion in federal support late last year. Organizers hope the service
will begin in time for the 2028 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles.

— Paige McClanahan

8.Luxury and Wellness: Is the Boom Real?

After the travel frenzy of 2023, all signs point to increasing interest in far-flung
destinations, villa rentals, private jet bookings and personal pilgrimages in 2024.

“The lust for luxury is real,” said Jack Ezon, the founder of the high-end travel
agency Embark Beyond. But, he added, mindfulness is poised to replace heedless
indulgence. “Consumers today are focused on sustainability, investment value and
craftsmanship when considering a luxury purchase,” he said.

“Travel provides the glue that pulls the family close together and unites it around a
shared passion,” said Tom Marchant, a co-founder of Black Tomato, which plans pricey
bespoke trips. Compared to 2019, 2023 bookings were up 64 percent, and demand
remains strong heading into the new year.

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This year, travelers are expected to choose faraway places and board small ships,
according to Virtuoso, the consortium of luxury travel agencies. In June, the new 264-
passenger Seabourn Pursuit from the luxury cruise line Seabourn will visit the remote
Kimberley region of Western Australia (10-day voyages start around $10,000 per
person). Black Tomato is planning private group treks to untrammeled destinations like
the Mitre Peninsula in Argentina’s Patagonia region, priced at more than $60,000 per
person.

Among luxury eco-conscious newcomers, Ki’ama Bahamas, slated to open in the fall,
promises to be the first fully solar-powered residential club in the Bahamas. This
month, Lepogo Lodges in South Africa will open the carbon-neutral Melote House,
accommodating up to 16 guests and funneling profits back into the Lapalala Wilderness
Reserve, where it is situated (nightly rates from $12,000).

Wellness travel, a market valued at over $600 billion, is expected to grow to $1.1 trillion
by 2025, according to the Global Wellness Institute, a nonprofit that tracks the industry.

“Medical wellness and longevity sciences have taken over the wellness market,” said
Beth McGroarty, the director of research and communications at the Global Wellness
Institute. Medical procedures like bone density testing, biometric screening and stem-
cell therapies are cropping up at resorts alongside low-tech programs that focus on
sleep, breathing and social connection.

Travelers will have no shortage of new destinations to feed their hunger for health. In
the spring, the new Ranch Hudson Valley will open near Tuxedo Park, N.Y., a spinoff of
the original in Malibu, Calif., offering three-night-minimum stays and featuring colonics,
cryotherapy and guided hikes (from $3,280 per person). SHA Mexico opens near Cancún
in late January, with programs that address sexual health, stress reduction and sleep
(minimum four-day stays start at $5,770).

— Elaine Glusac

9. The Middle East: Are Tourist Returning?

Travelers appear to be slowly returning to some Middle East nations despite the
continuation of the Israel-Hamas conflict that all but decimated the region’s
tourism since it began on Oct. 7. Travel operators said that bookings to countries
including Egypt, Jordan and Oman are growing, welcome news for an area that’s
dependent on tourist dollars and one that had received a record number of
visitors since the height of the pandemic.

“The Middle East was on track to be one of our biggest leaders in post-pandemic travel
recovery, and with this momentum swinging back, it shows just how powerful its appeal
is to travelers,” said James Thornton, the chief executive of Intrepid Travel, a global tour
company.

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Intrepid’s bookings for tours in Oman — and Tunisia in Northern Africa — have
experienced explosive demand, more than doubling from last year, the company said.

Closer to the conflict, booking figures in Egypt are rising, travel operators said, with
hopes pinned on Nile River tours, a tourist mainstay. Beach holidays in coastal
destinations such as Hurghada and Sharm el Sheikh are also picking up, said Khaled
Ibrahim, a Cairo-based consultant for Amisol Travel Egypt and a member of the Middle
East Travel Alliance.

And in Jordan, Intrepid’s bookings for family tours this year have increased 22 percent
from last year.

In Israel, tourism has not yet rebounded, and its absence is hurting local businesses,
said Harry Rubenstein, who runs Harry’s Baked, a tour company with excursions in
Jerusalem, Tel Aviv and Ramle. He said he had a few tours this month, but nothing
scheduled beyond next week.

“There aren’t any conventional tourists visiting now,” Mr. Rubenstein said.

Eyal Carlin, Israel’s tourism commissioner to North America, said international visitors
had recently begun trickling into Israel to volunteer. He added that he expected this
type of travel, the majority of which is faith-based, to remain “steady” over the next
several months.

Additionally, airline service to Israel has not returned to prewar levels: The number of
available inbound flights from January through March is down about 31 percent
compared with the same period last year, according to data from Cirium, an aviation
analytics company. In the United States, Delta Air Lines has paused flights until March
29, and American Airlines has discontinued service through April 4. United Airlines has
suspended its flights indefinitely, said Josh Freed, a United spokesman.

— Christine Chung

10. Walt Disney World ticket prices for 2025

The lowest single-day price for Animal Kingdom has gone up by $10
for 2025 tickets.
AaronP/Bauer-Griffin/GC Images/Getty Images

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Walt Disney World has put 2025 tickets on sale, and prices for many tickets have gone
up from 2024 pricing.

Some of the lowest single-day, single-park ticket prices have gone up by $10 for 2025.

For example, some late-August weekday tickets at Disney’s Animal Kingdom have gone
from $109 for 2024 tickets to $119 for 2025.

Other single-day tickets for different parks during different periods are also showing
increases over many 2024 prices.

For example, on a Saturday in late April when demand is high, Animal Kingdom is $169
in 2025, up from $164 in 2024.

Magic Kingdom also rose by $5, from $184 to $189, on that same weekend day in late
April.

The maximum single-day, single-park ticket published price for 2025 is $189 as of
February 27. That’s the same as the peak price in 2024. Ticket prices for November and
December 2025 were not yet available as of February 27.

Prices on the Park Hopper options that allow guests to visit multiple parks on the same
day have also gone up by about $5 to $10 for many dates in 2025.

This isn’t the first price hike at Disney parks in recent years.

Two increases were implemented in 2022 at Walt Disney World. Disneyland has also
increased prices more than once recently.

Disney taking new approach

The way Walt Disney World is rolling out its latest price changes is new, according to
Don Munsil, who runs the travel website MouseSavers.com.

“In the past, Disney just raised all the ticket prices at once rather than rolling out new
prices as they added new dates to their calendar,” Munsil said in an email. “The last time
the prices went up, a specific date might be $144 on one day, and then after the price
increase that same exact date is now $151. So this new strategy is interesting, because
all the 2024 prices remained unchanged.”

Munsil said multiday ticket prices also rose by $5 to $10 per day for 2025.

He added that Disney could still choose to raise 2024 prices.

“But if this holds, it represents a new way of raising prices that makes ticket pricing
stable for a specific date,” Munsil said.

In good news for Disney guests, Walt Disney World has introduced a water park
perk for visitors who book at a Disney Resort hotel in 2025. Admission on check-in day

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to one of the water parks — Typhoon Lagoon or Blizzard Beach — is included in their
stay.

11. The wealthy are cutting the line at the

airport, Disney World and ski resorts
Cutting in front of someone who’s been waiting patiently in line used to be unethical,
bad manners, taboo. Now, businesses are letting people pay for the privilege of skipping
the line.

Across everything from ski lifts to dating apps, and fueled by relatively new technology,
there’s been an explosion of options and services that let wealthier people pay to go
first.

At the airport, travelers with a Clear membership — about $189 a year — are escorted
to the front of TSA security lines by company “ambassadors” (as the people behind them
in line grumble). Clear has rapidly grown to around 19 million members, and it plans to
expand further into the hospitality, health care, financial services and online shopping
industries.

Dating app Tinder offers a new $499-a-month membership with a “skip the line” feature
that prioritizes a dater’s profile. Snowbird and other ski resorts, in a controversial
change, allow visitors who pay extra to access expedited ski lifts. In December,
Killington introduced a “Four-Day Fast Track” for $199 on top of its daily regular fee of
about $165, and it sometimes sells out. Universal Studios theme park offers an
unlimited “Express Pass” starting at $109.99 per person — on top of the admission
price — which allows holders to skip the line right on the spot.

And, most troubling of all, during the pandemic, wealthy patients paid top dollar to
jump to the front of the Covid-19 vaccine queue.

This trend is accelerating because businesses recognize that lines — and how much
people will pay to avoid them — are a way to make money. And they now have the
technology to do so.

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 Clear lets you skip to the front of the TSA line for about $189 a year. Getty Images

Smartphones, mobile payments and other technology that let people pay in advance,
reserve spots and scan tickets have made it easier for businesses to automate and de-
personalize cutting the line. The pandemic sped up consumer adoption of mobile
payments and pickup orders.

Of course, businesses have long segmented customers based on loyalty or how much
they spend, and some customers have always found hidden and informal ways to jump a
line — slipping the restaurant host some cash, for example. But it’s institutionalized
now.

“What used to be done on an ad-hoc basis with a local manager is now done on a
national basis,” said Edward Tenner, a distinguished scholar in the Smithsonian’s
Lemelson Center for the Study of Invention and Innovation and the author of “The
Efficiency Paradox.”

There’s a big difference between an airline rewarding frequent travelers, which is a way
for businesses to reward their most profitable customers, and offering faster ski lift
access for a price, Tenner said.

“They are no longer rewards for patronage, but a pure auction,” he said.

Paying for privileges

Paying to skip the line is part of a booming industry of advantages — if you can afford
them.

There have always been VIPs and perks for wealthier customers: orchestra seats at
theaters, boxes at stadiums and first class seats on airlines. But, other than perhaps
some food and drink and a better sight line, attendees were having similar experiences.
Not so now.

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The skier who pays to take the pricier ski-lift line at Snowbird may fit in many more
runs in a day. The wealthier kids whose parents pay for the “Lightning Line” at the
Slinky Dog Dash roller coaster at Disney World can pop on and move on. Regular guests
are waiting an average of 88 minutes in line — that’s longer than the “Toy Story” movie
that inspired the ride.

Don Munsil, president of travel website MouseSavers.com, said Disney faced backlash
from frequent visitors when it first rolled out an expanded, pricier program to cut ride
lines.

But it’s targeted at first-time visitors, who are most eager to get on the most
desirable rides and willing to pay an extra fee, he said.

There are downsides to this business model. The gulf between the haves and the have-
nots has widened in recent decades, and dividing consumers based on means and how
much they can pay to skip a line may create more hostility and resentment.

Many skiers, for example, protested the ski resorts’ move, calling it “sanctioned cutting
for rich people,” and 13,000 people signed a petition calling on them to abandon the
expedited lanes (they didn’t). Sen. Ron Wyden of Oregon complained about Mt.
Bachelor’s pass, saying it would “exacerbate equity issues” and create a “two-tiered
system of access to public lands based on financial ability.”

And skipping the line raises concerns about fairness and service quality for people who
don’t want or have the means to pay extra fees.

“We hate waiting. Standing in line and seeing people pass by you makes you even more
frustrated,” said Gad Allon, a professor of operations, information and decisions at the
University of Pennsylvania.

In the best-case scenario, businesses can use the funds from line jumpers to improve
service for everybody else, Allon said. But that’s rarely the case. By removing the
wealthiest or highest-paying customers from a line, there’s little incentive to advocate
for better service for the rest.

“Wealthiest customers are also those that would have most leverage to improve service
for everyone,” Edward Tenner said. “You’re taking them out and, therefore, depriving
the masses.”

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12. Spanish city to charge landmark entry fee to
control overtourism
Entry will remain free for the city’s residents under plans announced by the
mayor
Isambard Wilkinson
Madrid

The Plaza de España in Seville is a popular destination for

tourists. Getty.

Built on a semicircular Neo-Moorish palatial structure framed with tall towers and four
bridges over a moat, Seville’s Plaza de España is visited by thousands of people every
day from all over the world, in horse-drawn carriage and on foot.

However, plans by the city to charge an entry fee to the square in an attempt to rein in
mass tourism have resulted in a popular backlash, prompting the Spanish government
to respond.

“We are planning to close the Plaza de España and charge tourists to finance its
conservation and ensure its safety,” José Luis Sanz, Seville’s conservative mayor, wrote
in a post on Twitter/X. The post was accompanied by a video showing missing tiles,
damaged facades and street vendors occupying alcoves and stairs.

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 Spain’s finance minister criticised the plans to ‘privatise public
space’. Getty Images

The complex, built by the architect Aníbal González for the Ibero-American Exhibition of
1929, would still be free of charge for residents of the city and the municipalities of the
province.

María Jesús Montero, senior deputy prime minister of the Socialist-led government and
head of the treasury ministry, which is responsible for the square, immediately
criticised the plans.

“Privatising public space cannot be the answer to the care and preservation of Seville’s
Plaza de España, a cultural jewel that belongs to everyone,” she posted on X. “The
ministry of finance is certainly not going to back this.”

The plan to charge an entry fee was greeted with a storm of opposition online and from
tourists at the site.

“For us this is the most iconic place in the city, the one we most wanted to see, more
than the cathedral,” an Italian tourist told El País. “It seems crazy, this is a public space.”
He added: “They wanted to close St Mark’s Square [in Venice], but it was impossible.”

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 European cities have been struggling to strike a balance between
the benefits and drawbacks of mass tourism. Getty Images

The tax has revived a debate over the sustainability of mass tourism. Many cities are
struggling to find balance between much-needed tourism and maintaining their appeal
to residents. Venice will introduce a trial fee from April to limit the number of visitors.

Some Seville residents suggested that instead of charging for access to the square, a tax
should be levied on tourists. “A tourism tax for all visitors provokes less debate and
generates more income. Listen to the people, not the hoteliers,” one wrote online.

With more than three million tourists a year and a population of 700,000, Seville is the
third most visited city in Spain, which in turn is one of the world’s most visited
countries, with tourism representing 13 per cent of GDP.

Sources: <https://www.nytimes.com/search?query=travel+predictions+for+2024>, accessed on

23/02/2024, <https://edition.cnn.com/travel/walt-disney-world-2025-higher-ticket-
prices/index.html> , < https://edition.cnn.com/2024/02/08/business/line-skipping-clear-
disney/index.html?iid=cnn_buildContentRecirc_end_recirc >,
<https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/tourists-will-be-charged-to-visit-sevilles-plaza-de-espana-
m5tsvm27g>, accessed on 28/2/2024).

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