MADRID – In one of Madrid’s most famous neighborhoods, stickers reading “F**k Airbnb” have been pasted on doorways as part of an anti-tourism campaign.
Lavapiés is a poor inner-city area of Spain’s capital that is becoming increasingly popular with tourists staying in Airbnb accommodations.
But residents say the area’s original character is disappearing as an influx of foreigners and soaring housing prices drive out older residents.
“Fuck Airbnb – save the barrio” is the campaign’s slogan, which hopes to prevent Lavapiés from becoming like other parts of the city that are inundated with tourists.
On one wall is a painting that says “A home for the people who live there.”
This is the latest anti-tourism protest to take place in Spain, following similar demonstrations in the Canary Islands, Malaga, Barcelona and the Balearic Islands.
“People are anonymously putting these stickers on doorsteps to prevent Airbnb apartments from opening here,” said Guillermo Hormigo, a journalist with the local online newspaper Somos Lavapies (We Are Lavapies). “There is,” he said.
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“They also want to prevent one of Madrid’s most emblematic neighborhoods from becoming like other areas where locals are forced out and only foreigners live.”
Mari Carmen, a long-term resident, said tourists were partying until the early hours of the morning, causing trouble for local residents.
“I met someone at the door, but I don’t know whether that person lives here or not. The everyday conversation of exchanging something has already disappeared into history,” she told Somos Ravapies Told.
According to the city council, 92% of tourist apartments in Madrid are illegal or unregistered, and it wants to freeze permits for even more.
The explicit campaign in Madrid is similar to another anti-tourism protest in Malaga, where stickers such as “My family lived here” and “Go home” were pasted on the doors of tourist apartments. ing.
Dani Romero started the Málaga campaign after discovering that the rental house he had lived in for 10 years was about to be converted into tourist accommodation. It quickly snowballed into protests in cities in southern Spain.
Meanwhile, protesters in the Canary Islands ended a hunger strike after 20 days demanding that authorities change their mass tourism model.
The protest group Canarias se agota (Canaries have their limits), which staged the demonstration, said authorities were not responding to the protests.
