Before visiting Barcelona in March, I’d read the headlines with a healthy mix of scepticism and concern.
Tourists sprayed with water guns. Locals shout: ‘Tourists go home!’ More protests planned.
They painted the picture of a people fed up with the economy of coming and going. And there was no escaping it: my presence could contribute to the problem. I was travelling to run the city’s marathon – one of its biggest international events – and wondered if I’d picked the wrong time.
As is so often the case, the reality was more nuanced.
Big events bring big money – but also big crowds
International marathons are big business. According to its title sponsor, Bank of America, the 2022 Chicago Marathon generated about €340 million, created almost 3,000 jobs and pumped €145 million into the local economy.
Barcelona’s marathon isn’t quite on that scale, but still 27,000 people signed up for the March race – 7,000 more than ever before.
That’s roughly the number nine cruise ships would carry at full capacity, all descending on the city for one morning of hard work and one night of celebratory cava and vermút.
Would the city bristle at yet another influx of visitors eager to get lost in the Gothic Quarter, marvel at Gaudí’s masterpieces and feast their way through the mercats?
Not at all. I wasn’t met with water guns – although they would’ve been welcome at points along the 42-kilometre course – but with cries of encouragement.
Thousands of locals lined the streets. The energy was electric. The city felt proud.
None of this was a surprise. Marathons have yet to become targets for anti-tourism protestors, even if ‘race-cations’ are on the rise.
Still, the tension is real, and the impacts of overcrowding aren’t hard to find.
Why some locals are reaching their limit
Barcelona is one of Europe’s most visited cities. More than 12 million people visit each year, and about five million make a beeline for Park Güell and Sagrada Família alone. The pressure on these places – and on the people who live nearby – is immense.
Yet tourism accounts for more than 125,000 jobs and nearly 15 per cent of the city’s economy.
For many locals, this isn’t about banning tourists. It’s about finding a sustainable balance.
“Barcelona is a much calmer, safer and more welcoming city than what is reported, but sometimes we pay more attention to isolated events that make a lot of noise,” says Jordi Luque Sanz, a Barcelona native, food writer and senior culinary attaché at Bon Vivant Communications, a firm that manages chefs and high-end restaurants around the world.
“Having said that, I will not deny that tourism has grown enormously in recent years, that we lack an adequate model because no government has been interested in developing one seriously and that some areas are very overcrowded.”
During my trip, checklist destinations like La Rambla and Sagrada Família were packed, despite grey, wet and unpredictable weather. At one restaurant, I watched as a waiter – with the patience of a saint – repeatedly turned away diners who had ignored a “reservations only” sign and barged in to ask for a table, always in English.
At Park Güell, confused visitors, unaware they needed to book tickets online, met with exasperated workers. There, I overheard one staff member exclaim to a Spanish-speaking couple: “What a miracle to hear people speaking Spanish in this place!”
Cruise ships and short-term lets are under scrutiny
Much of the strain stems from how people visit the city.
Among the biggest flashpoints are short-term rentals and cruise ship tourism. Many apartments have been converted intoAirbnbs, pricing out locals and turning once-quiet streets into party zones.
“Here we don’t have ‘suburbia,’” says Ann-Marie Brannigan, an Irish expat and co-founder of Runner Bean Tours who has lived in Barcelona for almost 20 years. “Some people don’t know much about neighbourhood or flat living. It took me years to get used to it.”
She says that many tourists will often sit out on balconies or terraces, drinking and talking long after midnight – a taboo in Barcelona communities.
“If you want to have fun and party, you should go out to zones where there are clubs,” she advises.
Meanwhile,cruise ships unload thousands of day-trippers who rarely stay long enough to contribute meaningfully to the local economy.
Last May, Barcelona’s mayor, Jaume Collboni, warned that the volume of short-term travellers was overwhelming popular areas and crowding public transport. “We are reaching a limit, and we need to put a cap [on one-day visitors],” he said.
The cultural toll is just as concerning.
Longtime residents are watching their city change as historic bars, restaurants and neighbourhood markets are rebranded to suit the tastes of a transient crowd, and chintzy shops now occupy historic buildings in El Born and the Gothic Quarter.
What travellers can do differently
Beyond the big-name attractions, though, a less saturated and more rewarding Barcelona still exists.
The Recinte Modernista de Sant Pau offers a remarkable look at Barcelona’s modernist movement with a fraction of the crowds of Sagrada Família just down the road.
Small coffee shops like Dalston and Sip pair locally roasted beans with friendly service.
Less-frequented venues like the historic Mercat de Sant Antoni and pintxo favourite Quimtet & Quimtet – standing tables only – offer antidotes to overcrowded hotspots.
These are the kinds of experiences experts like Luque suggest seeking out.
“The great monuments – La Sagrada Família, Casa Batlló, the Picasso Museum – are fabulous, but it’s worth trying to get to know other places, such as the neighbourhoods of Poble Nou or Sants, where everything is much more real,” he says.
Luque recommends local markets like Mercat del Ninot and Mercat de Galvany over the packed Boqueria and encourages travellers to explore quieter corners of Eixample, “not just along and around Paseo de Gracia, which is a wonderful street but too crowded.”
Dunnigan suggests places like Montjuïc and Glòries if you want to see more local – and overlooked – sides of the city. “The cemetery in Montjuïc is absolutely beautiful, and no one goes there,” she says, highlighting the Art Nouveau-style mausoleums built by the city’s bourgeois for their loved ones around the turn of the 20th century.
Glòries, she adds, offers a window into the city’s modern architecture, including landmarks like the excellent Design Museum of Barcelona and Encants Market.
And she encourages visiting community festivals instead of just big ones like La Mercè.
“Every neighbourhood has two a year, with food and sardanas (traditional music dancing),” says Brannigan. “They’ll give you a much more local feel.”
It also helps to know – and follow – local etiquette. Luque has a few suggestions.
Don’t go shirtless, he says. Avoid rowdy antics in residential neighbourhoods. Drinking in the street? Not allowed. And learn a few Catalan or Spanish phrases. “A ‘gràcies’ for thank you or ‘hola’ for hello always helps and a smile opens many doors,” he says.
Is Barcelona at a crossroads?
At a recent summit in the city, protestor Elena Boschi made a pointed declaration to the media members in attendance: “We want tourists to have some level of fear about the situation – without fear, there is no change.”
Her words underline the growing tension between a city that depends on tourism yet struggles to manage its impact – a tension that’s evident to anyone visiting the city.
With protestors planning Europe-wide disruptions on 15 June – across Barcelona, Venice, Lisbon and beyond – the atmosphere is more volatile than ever. But it’s also clear that Barcelona isn’t vehemently anti-tourist. It’s simply asking for a different kind of tourist: one who comes with curiosity and listens as much as they look.
