Manage tourist overcrowding without reducing it or implementing specific measures to limit it. This is how one could summarize the plan launched by the Barcelona City Council to manage the city’s tourist zones and control overcrowding in them.
In order to do so, the council has determined the definition of 16 areas of great affluence (EGA), zones that, according to the plan, concentrate the greatest influx of people, whether residents or visitors, and which will be the target of the measures defined by the plan.
This plan, which comes just a few days after the PSC has rejected, together with Junts, the limitation plan against temporary rental apartments will start to be implemented this summer with a series of 33 measures
what are the Espais de Gran Afluència (EGA) in Barcelona?
EGAs are considered to be areas of public saturation, where there has been a transformation of activity and uses with a predominance of those focused on the visitor and even maintain a certain difficulty to develop daily activity and community life and where even neighborhood life has “some difficulty”
The EGA list is as follows:
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- Park Güell
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- Rovira Hill
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- Sagrada Familia
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- Las Glorias
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- Rambla del Poblenou
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- Forum Park
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- Littoral Front
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- Passeig de Gràcia and Plaça Catalunya
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- San Antonio Market
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- La Boqueria – La Gardunya
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- La Rambla
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- San Pedro – Santa Catalina – la Ribera
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- Gothic Quarter
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- La Barceloneta
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- Montjuïc – Poble-sec
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- Camp Nou
Of these 16 areas, half are considered eminently touristic: Park Güell, Sagrada Familia, Boqueria – Gardunya, Passeig de Gràcia – Plaça Catalunya, Barri Gòtic, La Rambla, Sant Pere – Santa Caterina – La Ribera i la Barceloneta.
how will this plan be implemented? Anti-tourism measures… designed for tourists
“Minimize” the inconvenience that tourist activity can generate for the residents of Barcelona, while ensuring that it “continues to bring wealth and dynamism”. To this end, the City Council has defined a new tourism management plan for the city.
Among the city measures, for example, is the creation of an EGA Technical Coordination Office, the creation of an EGA data office to properly understand and analyze the impacts on these environments. The plan also involves increasing the number of civic agents to 70 during the summer campaign compared to the 58 (or 12 more for the whole city) that are in place the rest of the year; the implementation of a program to support local commerce in these areas.
In addition, the plan foresees “managing” tourist overcrowding by intensifying the campaign to control street vending or reinforcing cleaning and security operations, among others.
he plan will begin to be applied in 3 EGA: the area around the Sagrada Familia, Park Güell and the area between the Boqueria Market and Plaça de la Gardunya.
Sagrada Familia and surroundings
Since this summer around the Sagrada Familia work has begun on the definition of the urbanization project of Provença and Marina streets and the improvement of access to the subway; reform of the Pablo Neruda square; the reorganization of public space and existing urban elements around the temple; the burying of overhead supply lines and the rearrangement of the tourist coach parking that has been done.
Boqueria and Plaça de la Gardunya
As for the EGA Gardunya – Boqueria, 1.8 million euros are planned for the improvement of the Doctor Fleming Gardens and specific interventions in La Gardunya square; the hiring of four new civic agents in the Mercat de la Boqueria and its surroundings; the reform and consolidation of the porch of the Rubió and Lluch gardens and the facade of the Hospital street enclosure; apart from a specific plan to change the dynamics of coexistence and security in La Gardunya square.
Park Güell
Finally, and as for the Park Güell EGA, some measures envisaged in the plan have already been recently presented, such as the extension of the traffic restriction area in the Salut neighborhood, the rearrangement of cab ranks, the introduction of reinforcements on bus lines 24, V29 and 116 -the latter has been removed from the routing applications-, as well as the introduction of online ticket sales only.
The EGA Plan also envisages other measures such as the redevelopment of the surroundings of the Park Güell such as Torrent del Remei street, Font del Carbó or the connection of Repartidor street with Turull passage. The Plan also foresees the acquisition of La Miranda as a public facility in the Salut neighborhood to consolidate it as a cultural and community space in the neighborhood.
Communication campaign aimed at tourists
The EGA Plan is born with a specific communication campaign aimed at tourists and visible in the city since this week. With the main slogan Barcelona, “our home. And yours’ and the subtitle ‘Everyone is welcome. Be respectful and you’ll be respected’, this responsible tourism campaign can be seen in different formats and locations in the city until the end of next August.
The campaign contains a decalogue of seven specific tips that aim to raise awareness among visitors of the need to respect the rules. With a message in English, it is reminded that the neighborhood deserves a good night’s rest, it is pointed out that the people of Barcelona are proud of their city and that is why visitors are asked to take care of the city as the local population does, or the need to use water responsibly is reminded.
The campaign messages will be visible in tourist information offices, city hotels, municipal markets, buses or in bins installed in public places such as Plaça Catalunya, Sagrada Familia, Sant Miquel beach, in the Port of Barcelona area where cruise passengers disembark or in Plaça dels Països Catalans, among other places.