This summer, over one million visitors, spectators, and athletes are expected to gather in the streets of Paris for the 2024 Summer Olympic Games. The preparation for the event included massive investments into upgrading infrastructure, venues, and public spaces throughout the city and country. In addition to the restoration of Grande New de I'Île-des-Vannes venue, the Georges-Callerey Swimming Pool, and the Poissonniers Sports Center, the city has revealed new typologies of public services and a master plan for the Olympic Athletes Village by Dominique Perrault Architecture.
While the event of the 2024 Summer Olympics will garner an incredible amount of attention, Paris is not the only city that is bracing for a strained season of tourism this year. Venice continues to navigate a tumultuous relationship with the negative effects of over-tourism, the residents of Barcelona are voicing their concerns of displacement and economic exploitation, and cities throughout Southeast Asia continue to see correlating numbers of tourists and biodiversity loss. The impacts of over-tourism, cultural commodification, and environmental harm from tourism development are universal concerns, shared by dense urban centers and rural communities alike.
Fortunately, there are many creative designers, planners, and policymakers who integrate spaces and networks of tourism into the built environment with the support of the local residents. Since the development of tourism undeniably impacts the infrastructure, planning, economy, and local ecology of the surrounding environment, there is a unique opportunity to invest in the public spaces and infrastructures of the existing context.
Complementing Historic Monuments with Contemporary Architecture
Sitting at the foot of the Athens Acropolis, the New Acropolis Museum, designed by Bernard Tschumi Architects, bridges multiple key archeological sites in modern-day Athens to the iconic campus of the Greek Acropolis. Acting as a narrative aid to the Parthenon, the exhibition space of the museum unites collections spanning thousands of years to tell a story of human presence on the Acropolis. Without attempting to overshadow the presence of the Parthenon on the Acropolis, the museum injects a historical, social, and cultural context of the site throughout the years of development and evolution, enhancing the iconic environment of contemporary Athens.
Urban environments are in constant states of change. By blending contemporary architectural moments with historical monuments, designers and planners can maintain a cohesive urban fabric to elevate the image of the city. Although contemporary architectural spaces contrast with historically preserved monuments, such as the Athens Acropolis, this form of architectural intervention prevents spatial fragmentation into strictly old versus new areas of the city. When coupled with contemporary projects, historic monuments are not frozen in time, but become relevant, functional, and engaged with the current cultural and technological contexts.
Unified Images in Tourism Networks
Completed in 2016, the network of tourism pavilions throughout the capital city of Madrid are strategically situated to complement the sites with the greatest traffic from tourism crowds. Designed by the offices of Irene Brea and José Manuel Sanz Arquitectos, the iconic form of the pavilion series is quickly recognizable to the visitor in need of direction, guidance, or information, but the materiality seamlessly blends into the existing fabric of the city. Adhering to the primary guiding design principles of transparency and lightness, those in the interior of the centers are included in the activity of the city while the passing pedestrians can interact with the workers and information on the inside.
Without a clear vision for the visitor experience of discovering the city, the tourist will tire easily, become disoriented, or grow disengaged, altogether. The opportunity to design a network of pavilions throughout the urban environment transforms the purposes of the architectural spaces from strictly informative purposes, to a unified network for rest, orientation, and energy. By ensuring that the day of sightseeing, walking, and wandering through the city is cohesive and enjoyable, a tourism network can encourage longer stays and leave a positive lasting impression of the city and its sites.
Serving Local Communities through Tourism
Located in the small village of Pai Town in Linzhi, the southeastern part of Tibet autonomous region, the Tibet Namchabawa Visitor Center celebrates the cultural history of the village and the extraordinary beauty of the Mount Namchabawa and Yaluntzangpu Grand Canyon. While servicing the backpackers that embark on the networks of hiking, the Visitor Center has transformed into a "town center" for the residents, as well. While the design team of standard architecture included necessary elements to service the backpacking travelers, such as a supply store, medical aid, and a reception desk, the town center holds a water reservation tank and a central electrical switch house for the residents of the village. While fulfilling the needs of the visitor, the design team successfully elevated the quality of life for the permanent residents of the Yaluntzangpu Canyon region.
From examples in Barcelona, Paris, and countless others, the tourism industry can exacerbate existing inequalities if the benefits, resources, and profits from welcoming visitors are not distributed well among the existing residents. By including the community members in the planning and design processes, the conversation will include a sustainable approach to distributing resources. Since the local community has a profound understanding of the cultural and ecological context, they are valuable stakeholders to ensure that development is sustainable and responsible. If the residents are able to shape the strategies for development in conjunction with tourism, there is a lower risk of cultural exploitation, displacement from gentrification, and environmental degradation. These enhancements to the tourism industry can act as an opportunity to serve the needs of the community when meaningfully included in the design and planning stages.
Short-term visions for tourism development will amplify the negative consequences of over-tourism, fragmented city planning, environmental degradation, cultural commodification, and an increased pressure on local resources. The goal of architecture and infrastructure serving these tourism developments should not be concentrated on a singular event or experience, but rather on how to strengthen the relationship between the visitor, the resident, and the environment. In this context, the impact of design and planning decisions extends far beyond the original program of promoting a tourism event or experience. There is an opportunity with developing networks and sites of tourism to integrate local knowledge, invest in the infrastructure or local neighborhoods for the area, and build resilient communities.
