Tourism · 9:25am Aug 13th, 2017
Does anyone else live in a city which gets inundated with tourists at this time of year? Mine always has plenty, but it seems this year the weak pound has brought them out in greater numbers than usual. On some streets you can hardly move without running into a mass of Chinese, Japanese, Americans, Australians, Germans, Italians, and every other nationality as well as the usual British visitors. Undeterred by the poor weather, they are out in force with knapsacks, cameras, guidebooks and sunglasses. Determined to visit all the film locations from Harry Potter and other blockbusters.
Of course it is really lovely that so many people from all around the world want to come and see us. We appreciate it. Honestly we do. It is nice to know that our international friends still want to visit despite the fact that our government has thrown the European Union into such a crisis. We know that tourists contribute enormously to the economy and create thousands of jobs.
But it would be nice if they didn’t just stand in the middle of the road taking photos when I need to get by.
The best solution seems to be to return the compliment and go and be a tourist in someone else’s city. So I have my knapsack, camera, guidebook and sunglasses ready, and I am flying the US to spend a few days in Washington DC, before heading to South Carolina to view The Eclipse with Needling Haystacks (who, by the way, has some interesting videos on YouTube giving a meticulous analysis of pony episodes and other stuff). So expect some eclipse-related stuff from both of us. (Although the weather forecast is cloudy).
Meanwhile if anyone wants a fun story to read on a plane/train/tour bus, take a look at my largely forgotten work Elements of a Successful Tourist Industry.
Forgotton work? Nice episode.
Theres not much in the way of tourist stuff left where I live, burnt down, demolished, bankrupt, closed etc. The only tourists I can even remember were a coach full that were streaming out of the volunteer mill stlll under restoration next to where I live, that were all the way from Stalybridge 30 miles away, visiting the area on a history tour of maybe half a dozen sites across as many towns, as in each town that succeeded, people only managed to save one of dozens or even hundreds of possible sites.
There was one construction proposed in the 1800s that wuldve been maybe unique in its final form. First there was a canal proposed, but the hills are so bad, the design called for a double sided inclined plane, tanks of water on rais, for each side of the hill. The canal was dropped, but the railway itself took the route instead. Just thinking how being a double track, that it couldve ended up being the only dual canal railway track in the UK, likely further afield?
Enjoy your trip in the US,a nd I hope you get to the right country coming back, depending which one it is by that time.
At I live in Edinburgh and the fringe festival occurs all August (and other festivals from about March onwards but the Fringe is the big one) yes! There's about 4000 official shows and probably about the same number of unofficial ones occur and there are a lot of tourists around. I don't seem to dislike it as much as many of the other locals though. I usually go to a dozen or so shows (of varying quality) and I live far enough out of the city centre to avoid most of the crowds while still close enough to be able to walk to more places in an hour so I'm not effected by the overcrowded transport system.
I'm surprised you didn't decide to hit Baltimore (very close to Washington) slightly earlier and thus gotten to go to BronyCon. (Where I am now)
I live in Salem, witch city, so we get the tourist rush around Halloween and all of October to a lesser extent. So much traffic. Luckily, I don't think we get people in the middle of the road taking pictures.
Hope you enjoy the trip over here. Wish I was getting to see the eclipse from down there and now wishing I could do it and say hi to my favorite ponyfic science writer.
I live in New York City, my dude. We're inundated with tourists every day.
I have to cross London Bridge every day. In the morning rush it is bad enough - I'm travelling south, so have to fight my way across against the oncoming hordes - but they usually (barring one or two idiots) allow a single southbound line.
In the evenings? Well, the evening rush is more spread out so the bridge isn't quite as crowded with commuters. That's when the tourists try to take out up to half the pavement taking photographs. And this being London, it happens all year round. It just gets worse during the summer.
Good luck with the eclipse.
4632873 So tell me, is there a single hotel room / AirBnB / spare bedroom / camping spot left there for Eclipse Day? When I was booking, there was something like two rooms for $600 each. (I ended up booking outside Portland where it was more like $100, and I'll be driving down early... or at least trying.)
4632990
Salem, Mass. East coast. As far as I know we aren't a big eclipse destination since we are only getting like 60% of sun coverage.
4632993 Oops
. I was assuming Salem, OR, which is probably also a big tourist spot since it's the state capitol... but Salem, MA does explain more your mention of Halloween...
As BrExit continues, you should get a lot more tourists as the pound drops like a stone. You will need the tourism-money because imports, like food, will go through the roof.
I am into electoral mathematics. It is okay to use simple majorities to pass reversable things, but for irreversible things, one should use a super majority to be sure. When we saw the vote for Scottish independents and BrExit, our reaction is that using a simple majority is a bucking stupid idea.
We get many tourists here in the summer because we have a section of town going back the the 19th century. That is unusual in this area because of earthquakes.
It could be worse. My experience, living in the US, is that every city that depends on tourism for most of its income spends absolutely nothing on any part of the city that isn't either the tourist area or where the people who run things live. Streets go unpaved, trash not picked up, police don't patrol. Compared to what the locals do (or fail to do) to the other locals, the tourists are no headache at all.
Aww, not Canada? Enjoy the trip and take lotsa good shots.
4632840
I actually only noticed the time-and-space proximity to Bronycon after I had booked my flight. Yeah, it does seem a bit of a missed opportunity, but it might be just as well—trying to fit that in as well as everything else would have been a bit much. I am also planning a cycling trip in Northern England before I get back to work. Bronycon will have to wait for another time.
4632873
Never been to Salem, but I do remember once having dinner with a church minister from the city. He kept me very entertained with stories about the local witches. He was an enthusiast of interfaith dialogue and was proud to say that, despite historical misunderstandings, the church now had a good relationship with the local covens. Although he did mention that being a witch in Salem was now a sufficiently profitable enterprise that he feared many practitioners were not motivated by authentic spiritual reasons but by the potential of a $100,000+ annual income for most of the year doing not much work.
4634090
That's interesting! Where does this income come from?
And a New England cycling trip sounds lovely. Have fun!
I live just south of Yosemite National Park, so yeah... big tourist influx in summer and on other major holidays. I, personally don't have any problem with the tourist flood. Traffic is easy to predict and work around, and those folks bring lots of lovely money to an otherwise depressed economic area.
The neat thing about tourists is that they come here because they're interested enough to spend a lot of time and money to come and experience things. Sure, some are idiots, but you can say that about people as a whole, so... what's the point?
4632834
I am occasionally one of those foreign tourists that clog up Edinburgh during the Fringe. Love the city, love the Fringe, and I've always felt welcome, though I know very well how locals can feel about tourists.