How tourists are turning this famous Paris street into "hell"
Residents of a famous Parisian street have asked the city to limit visitor access, as tourists and Instagrammers continue to flood the area to take pictures.
Filled with colourful houses, cobblestones and terracotta pots, Rue Crémieux has become one of Europe’s most popular photo spots, with over 31,000 pictures on Instagram to include the hashtag #ruecremieux.
However, residents of the street have become increasingly fed up with the influx of influencers, photographers, video makers and people looking to take snaps around their houses. Last week, the residents’ association finally demanded the city of Paris to close the street to visitors on evenings and weekends due to privacy concerns.
A Rue Crémieux local named Antoine told radio station France Info that the street’s overwhelming popularity has made life more difficult for residents.
“It became hell,” she said, claiming that she can find “200 people under our windows” on weekends.
“We sit down to eat and just outside we have people taking photos – rappers who take two hours to film a video right beneath the window, or bachelorette parties who scream for an hour. Frankly, it’s exhausting.”
An account named @clubcremieux has emerged on Twitter and Instagram to reveal visitors’ antics on the street, including pre-wedding shoots, group dances and acrobatic poses.
The residents said the average tourist is generally respectful, but the interloping on the evenings and weekends makes it necessary to install gates or other measures to keep visitors out.
According to Citylab, Rue Crémieux is not the only area in Paris which has attempted this move, as other small carless streets have resorted to getting barriers similar to this.
Over-tourism has become a top concern in many popular destinations across the world. While the newfound fame brought by social media can help promote tourism and boost local economies, it also creates problems for the government and residents involved, such as food shortages in Cuba, vandalism and hygiene issues in Iceland, or environmental damage in Thailand’s Maya Bay and New Zealand.
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