Ben Pawlowski
BARCELONA has voted to ban bar crawls across the city in the latest sign of the local council’s growing discontent with mass tourism.
The new decree follows an extensive trial period in the Catalan capital’s Old Town (Ciutat Vella) since 2012 and its Eixample neighbourhood since June.
Under the new legislation, promoting, organising, selling or planning pub crawls will be banned in a move designed to ‘improve coexistence for residents, sleep time for locals, and public health’.
While participants will get away scot-free if caught red-handed, organisers could be whacked with fines up to €900.
The new ban will apply across the city all-day – even though the trial periods only prohibited bar crawls between 7pm and 7am.
According to local police, the ban in the Old Town has been well received, with just three fines handed out last year.
The move is the latest attempt to alleviate growing local anger at mass tourism – last month, the local council voted to hike visitor levies over the next four years.
The incremental rises of €1 per year mean tourists will have to pay €8 in tax per person, per night by 2029 – double the current surcharge of €4.
When combined with the Catalan tourist tax, that means a single tourist staying in Spain’s second most visited city could have to cough up €15 for each night of their stay.
In June, anti-tourism protesters armed with water pistols took to the streets of Barcelona, mimicking the scenes that made headlines in the summer of 2024 as tourists having dinner were soaked by angry locals.
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An excellent move. That sort of behaviour is just contrary to everything in Spain and we don’t want it here.