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Comment by parpfish | Hacker News Reader

I think the more interesting story here wouldn’t be the “over tourism” of the globally desirable internet-famous locations— It’s all the little regional resort towns and tourism destinations that are now ignored.

All over the US are locations that used to be the place where a people would go for a three day weekend or summer getaway. But now they are ghost towns because the cost of travel and the algorithm have reframed travel as global and not regional.

Like… Niagara Falls used to be “the” honeymoon destination for couples in the northeast. Now it seems like every honeymoon is in a beachy tropical location and the falls have been gutted economically

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I understand this is what happened to UK beach towns when flying to Spain got cheap

And quite possibly also because UK beach towns are generally sad and cold (except for Cornwall and Devon for two weeks per year), compared to Spain’s? Signed, someone living in the UK.

No argument there!

This is something that I feel doesn't get discussed in a lot of these sorts of discussions (overtourism, local food, etc.). Reducing your carbon/social footprint by consuming locally is MUCH more enjoyable in some locations than in others.

if you find your local region unenjoyable, change your local region

Often that's not an option. E.g. due to where family lives, where you can find a job, or simply not being able to afford to move.

Your plan to address the decline in British beach towns is to depopulate the UK?

Seems a bit extreme just to avoid a plane ride.

but that's kind of the problem.

people insist that they need "the BEST", so they hop on a plane to get the picture-perfect locale that they see online at the expense of hollowing out anything that is merely "pretty good".

Isn't this what pricing is for? The "best" places can raise prices because of the high demand. Then the "pretty good" places in comparison wind up being a good value option.

> All over the US are locations that used to be the place where a people would go for a three day weekend or summer getaway. But now they are ghost towns because the cost of travel and the algorithm have reframed travel as global and not regional.

I find that local travelling within the US is often more expensive for the quality they offer and travelling outside the US may cost the same but give you a better experience, or at least novel.

A lot of those tiny locations all over the US are in red states. Lots of people aren't going to want to go to locations where public infrastructure has been hollowed out and discrimination is legal.

I think the point of is that every state had its decent share of local tourists going to local attractions. It's one thing if the blue state travelers who were traveling in the first place are now traveling somewhere else, but it's also an impact that there are also less local tourists in these states than there have been historically, because even the local tourists are now traveling elsewhere.

Either I get "Southern Hospitality" AKA decently outwardly friendly people (if you're white) and people who actually donate to charity or I get good infrastructure and legal weed, but people who are anti-social and would piss on the homeless if it were legal.

You can't win. This is why folks travel in the first place.

> and discrimination is legal.

Do you have proof of these red states re-legalizing discrimination, or repealing the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (and/or Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990)?

I failed to find anything about this supposed upheaval of established legal statute after a quick google search.

https://www.iowapublicradio.org/state-government-news/2025-0...

You're saying that large parts of red states aren't hostile to, say, LGBTQ people?

Why do they keep electing people who are, and passing legislature that is, then?

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