In The Year ...

This year has been slightly better than last year, according to the Mallorcan hotel federation. So, rejoicing all round. Perhaps. But if 2006 and 2007 have been “record years”, it could be you ain’t seen nothing yet. Miguel Hernández Magán is an expert in the hospitality industry. In today’s “Diario de Mallorca” he is quoted as saying that by 2020 the number of tourists to the Balearics will have doubled, which, on the face of it, sounds like good news. The problems would lie though in the infrastructure, specifically the transport system and most obviously - in the case of all of the islands - the respective airports. Over and above that, however, would be issues related to, among others, water. This is already a problem in, for example, Puerto Pollensa.

Hernández is a representative of a group that looks at the sustainability and quality of tourism, this group having adopted the concept of “holidays for all”, which would mean people from all parts of the European Union, and - he believes - an end to the inconvenience of the current seasonality of tourism. This, in turn, would help relieve the congestion reported a bit over a month ago (11 August: Never Far From The Madding Crowd). But would it really put an end to this? I find it hard to believe. Were it not to, then to accommodate (literally) this doubling of the tourist population would require a significant increase in hotel stock. Given that places like Alcúdia and Can Picafort are already “hotelled-out” (if one can use such an expression), it could be that other as yet undeveloped centres would become so. Son Serra de Marina, anyone?


QUIZ
Yesterday - U2. Today. Continue the title and you get 2525. Could have been Prince’s 2020 or some reference to England’s useless cricket team. But no, it’s Zager and Evans. And here’s the question. What prophesy in that song has already been realised?

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