Sick of some Cornish people bleating on as though they are the worlds only tourist destination

[Endlesssummer2022]

Just read the article below and found a few gems such as these:

’ have you ever wondered where the local people live? Or have you noticed that many of your holiday neighbours are recognisable in the narrow lanes of the pretty fishing villages because they are the same people you live near in London?’

and…

‘Despite what you may have read, we Cornish do welcome visitors and are happy to share our love of our land with you. But it might help if you do a bit of research – Cornwall is fiercely independent and has a proud and unique history and heritage…* *And try not to be rude to local people. If you’ve been asked to not drink from a glass bottle on the beach, there is a reason for that. Don’t forget to tip waiting staff. ‘

What patronising bollocks. So Londoner’s (as those are apparently the only people who visit Cornwall) are so untraveled and boorish we need to be told not to be rude to people, pay tips, not to smash glass bottles in sand, that we’ve bought all of their houses, that it’s ‘their’ land and we’re the ones who are rude?

I’d already decided I wouldn’t go back there after how some of them carried on during Covid but this article has pissed me off. Why would anyone go there when they can go to equally lovely places in the UK/World and not be treated with contempt?

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2023/may/29/welcome-to-cornwall-please-dont-ruin-it-for-us-local-people

@DdraigGoch Of course tourists are not distributed across the city and of course they contribute to overcrowding. They’re in inner London and most are in central London. Americans and Japanese don’t come here to visit Surbiton.

You can’t necessarily get the next tube or even the next - in the rush hour they’re all like that.

I don’t know where you live but if you don’t like it then move. I like it here but I avoid the rush hour because I can and the city is slowly grinding to a halt.

Anyway, this discussion is too dull now to continue. So I’m off.

Most tourists taxes are also paid by nationals although residents in the municipality are often exempt:

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourist_tax

A list of places with tourist taxes in 2022:

www.euronews.com/travel/2023/05/24/tourist-taxes-all-of-the-countries-you-will-have-to-pay-to-enter-in-2022

That's simply not true.

https://www.myswissalps.com/accommodation/touristtax
Swiss citizens staying in a town where they don't have permanent residence pay the tax too.

https://www.frenchentree.com/living-in-france/travel/what-is-frances-tourist-tax-taxe-de-sejour-and-who-pays-it/
You may be exempt from paying this tax if you permanently live and work in the same area

Nationality has nothing whatever to do with whether you are charged a tourist tax, people who are tourists in other parts of their own country pay the tax too. It's a tax on overnight accomodation.

They're better distributed than they are in Cornwall, where 10% of the entire footfall converges on one small seaside town. Have you ever left London? You don't seem to know much about the world beyond it, this sort of attitude is why people talk about a "metropolitan bubble".

So you've missed a couple of tube trains. You've now been there for - what - 15 minutes? You've just had a massive project to construct an RER-type line to relieve the Central Line. Standing on a tube train with your handbag for 20 minutes is nothing like being wedged on a two-coach train to Manchester with luggage and kids for 90.

And why should I leave? I like it here, I just want a few simple changes to make tourism more sustainable. Better public transport. A small charge on overnight accommodation (for which you get a local transport pass to encourage you to use that instead of the car). Stricter rules to stop second homers avoiding tax (now in force, one of the few good things the WAG has come up with). Licencing for holiday lets (also being implemented).

Being frustrated by arseholes and the general lack of infrastructure investment doesn't mean that I've got anything against the good tourists. As long as you take nothing but pictures and leave nothing but footprints then you're welcome. https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/1597541/snowdonia-litter-human-faeces-easter-holiday-bank-holiday-wales-pick-up-tourists

Oh, and make sure that you can park safely (or even better get the bus).
https://news.sky.com/story/snowdonia-dozens-of-vehicles-parked-dangerously-on-narrow-mountain-roads-towed-away-by-police-12852552

I live in the Lake District and I have a ‘friend’ who incessantly complains about tourists… driving slow, blocking pavements, being I the mountains too busy! Yet she goes to Cornwall every year without fail 🙄… She does my head in!

Fine, if you want to introduce tourist taxes it’s no skin off my nose, London can only benefit.

To whoever asked - no I’ve never left London in my life, I don’t speak 3 languages, never lived abroad and I’m not mixed race. You’d think my username might have been a clue.

Well you are clearly wilfully blind to the harmful effects of mass tourism. Despite your protestations the proportional increase in population does make a big difference.

I also find it really odd when Londoners moan about their public transport. I remember a ULEZ thread where someone complained that their town on the edge of Greater London 'only' got two buses an hour. Honestly, you really don't know you're born!

I suggest that you try visiting St Ives during silly season to see just how bad it is. You could also try taking a train to Barmouth or Rhyl on a Monday or a Friday to see what it's like - don't cheat by getting on one of the handful of direct London trains, try to get on one of the two-coach Manchester trains to see how bad it really gets.

Well you are clearly wilfully blind to the harmful effects of mass tourism

?? Yes that’s right I’m completely blind to the impact of mass tourism.

Have any other fatuous assumptions you w like to make? Along with the one that I’ve never been to Cornwall?

If you’re bitter about the transport in your area, move. Presumably you knew what it was like when you chose to locate there. You could always try sitting in a London traffic jam for a couple of hours, see if you prefer that.

Day 4: recognised as local by a Cornish lady I was chatting to about her dog. She said: I recognise you from here! I said, that's so lovely, I just have one of those faces. I was so upset not to be able to say I live just up the road.

@DdraigGoch maybe a native.

It's two months of difficulty now in N Wales. We keep our heads down use local beaches the tourists don't. Hills the tourists don't. Come and go early or late to work, shops. I'm glad the thoughtful tourists enjoy their time here. Hate the litter bugs, bad drivers but doesn't everyone including other tourists.

@justasking111 I was dog walking late today on the beach. Long beach, far from the crowded bit, totally wonderful. The amazing, god love them, RNLI were knocking off and we heard them tannoy people near the shore (at least half a mile from the flag zone) that as they'd already rescued them once today it'd be a good idea to call it a day. We didn't need a tannoy to hear the abuse.

WTF abuses the RNLI FFS?

Have any other fatuous assumptions you w like to make? Along with the one that I’ve never been to Cornwall?

Well that was the more charitable of the possible conclusions I could have drawn. If you've seen the state of St Ives in silly season and still think that the Cornish are moaning unnecessarily then there's no helping you.

If you’re bitter about the transport in your area, move.
Why should I? I'd sooner campaign to change things. I'm actually quite glad that the Welsh Government is looking to make things more sustainable, with a tourist tax and penalising second homes.

You could always try sitting in a London traffic jam for a couple of hours, see if you prefer that.
Why would anyone do that? Almost all of the city is covered by frequent TfL or National Rail services. Easier to just use those, or ride a bike. Doesn't work for tradesmen I suppose but most of the population have choices.

A few years ago a DfT civil servant asked why people in the North were complaining about "Pacer" trains. He had no idea what they were and why they were hated. So the MD of Northern Rail invited him to take a trip on a peak time stopping service from Liverpool to Manchester. Bloke was a gibbering wreck by the time that he got off.

It's not like I've got anything against Londoners, I just tire of the Pythonesque way in which any thread where someone mentions any issue that affects their local area, there's always someone who pipes up with "well we've got it worse in London". If it was something like air quality, you may have a point, but sometimes you have to accept that you actually are quite well off in some ways - public transport being one of them.

I’m from N Wales originally and know were to avoid in the summer… Many beaches on Anglesey for example! (I do know a couple of quiet ones though!).

I live in the Lakes now and it’s the same here… golden rule! Don’t drive through central lakes between the hours of 9 and 5! 🙈… I also now loads of lovely spots that the tourists don’t often venture

@DdraigGoch Jaysus you just go on and on.

St Ives in summer is no different from many many other global tourist hotspots yet the Cornish go on as if they’re a special case.

Secondly, if you actually read the thread properly, no-one has said Londoners have it worse. London comes up because a. it’s the prime tourist attraction in the whole country with far more visitors than anywhere else, and b. house prices are way in excess of Cornwall pricing out locals completely - but they don’t whine about it so much.

In fact, despite all the insults you throw out, you’re the one who sounds painfully naive. Campaigning for new travel infrastructure in your area is not likely to change anything in the short term. Brexit + Covid + col crisis put paid to that, and the country managed to vote away its EU investment. Your comments about London show you don’t know it that well - it’s vast and there are pockets not covered by a local train or tube, and routes so clunky by rail or bus that it’s quicker to drive. Even factoring in traffic.

I think the RNLI get a lot more abuse since Farage started standing on cliff tops going 'Look over there!'
We make a point of giving them more money these days.

Many people are giving less not because of Farage but the treatment by head office of these brave volunteers because they're not PC. we know some of them, they're fisherman and yes not woke. They've walked away rather than be booted out. Now they're recruiting more suitable boatmen who unfortunately get seasick so become part of the problem. It's frightening.

You realise that wages in Cornwall are much lower on average than they are in London? And never mind "clunky" routes, many parts of the UK get a bus every three hours.

And no, in my experience the Cornish don't go on as if they are a special case. They have a legitimate grievance that people from North Wales, the Lakes, Skye etc. have all been nodding in sympathy for - not just on this thread, there was one in active the other day complaining about the tourists on Skye. It's only Londoners who seem to take it as a personal insult when someone complains about tourists. It's a long thread but I don't recall anyone from Manchester or Leeds taking offence

I'm actually getting somewhere re: better public transport. Not all improvements require better funding, sometimes it's as simple as tweaking timetables to allow connections to work. European funding was already committed so they've got to honour it.

There was an article in the Times recently about the most over touristed cities in Europe, proportionate to population.

London was not one of them. It gets a lot of tourists but can cope.

I can't remember all of the ones on the list but it included Paris, Amsterdam, Venice, Dubrovnik and two in Greece, among others.

"bitter"

Is this a new word applied for when someone is pointing out that something could be improved?

"Bitter". FFS 🙄🙄🙄

Are these the statistics?
https://www.statista.com/chart/30115/annual-number-of-tourists-per-inhabitant/

Dubrovnik gets 36 tourists a year for every resident, and Amsterdam at the bottom of the list gets 12.

If London (a city of nearly 9m) gets 20m tourists per year, then it isn't even just off of the bottom of the scale, it's a very long way down. 2, to be precise.

St Ives by comparison has a population of 11k, sees 220k staying visitors and 540k daytrippers. That makes 10 overnight visitors for every resident and nearly 50 daytrippers. I'd say that people have every right to feel worn down at the end of the summer.

@DdraigGoch

Makes note to avoid Dubrovnik or at least go off season.