Camille Leihulu Slagle didn’t think much about tourists visiting her backyard when she was growing up in Kailua, a small town on the northeastern coast of Oahu, Hawai’i. The 20-year-old student’s childhood was full of family, friends, and adventures across the sandy beaches during an era unfettered by social media. In many ways, it was the Hawaiian dreamscape many tourists are in search of when they book their vacation to the chain of Pacific islands.
There’s just one key difference: this is not a luxurious vacation destination for Slagle. It’s her home. And in recent decades, it’s become increasingly threatened by mass tourism—a phenomenon that sees tens of thousands of people incentivized by cheap travel package deals and converging on a location at the same time of year.
GLOBAL PRESSURE
Hawai’i is hardly alone when it comes to communities vastly changed and endangered because of mass tourism. The famed Italian city of Venice has been sinking from the weight of massive cruise liners, Thailand’s Maya Bay is overrun with tourists and longtail boats vomiting smoke and dragging anchors through sensitive coral, and Amsterdam found itself suffocating under the foot traffic of nearly 20 million annual tourists in a city of 900,000 inhabitants. This is a global phenomenon threatening cities, communities, and ecosystems.
“Over the past few decades, the
