In the nineties between where I worked and where I bought my lunch was a square with an old building next to it. It was on the Japanese coach tour circuit. These groups of Japanese were quite literally herded by guides off their coach to a spot in the square in front of the building. They all then took a photo of the building and were then with incredible rapidity shepherded back onto the bus again. The direct walking route taken by me was between the groups of tourists and the building, so I must be a small figure in the lower part of hundreds of photos in albums held by ageing Japanese pensioners. At times it was like being a celebrity in front of the paparazzi: flashes going off like sparklers.
I’m not far from Waterton Lakes National Park, in Canada. It’s a beautiful park, with mountains and wildlife and a little townsite in the park itself. In the park, I’ve walked the trails, driven the roads, and seen deer, bears, and all kinds of birds. And in all seasons.
Summer is the worst. The businesses are all open, the townsite is full of people, and there is no place to park. I wonder why, with so many great things to go and see in the park, that people don’t go and see them–they stay in town, wander the shops, eat in the restaurants, and otherwise do things they could do in any town. Outside of town on the park roads, traffic crawls–the guy in the giant RV (and there are many guys in giant RVs) is hoping to see a bear or a deer.
But winter is a treat. The town is closed–nearly every place is boarded up. One hotel remains open, and its restaurant serves a pretty good lunch even in the off-season. Many of the park roads are open, though you do pay attention to avalanche warning signs. Still, the beauty of the mountains in winter and the frozen lakes make me wonder why more people don’t head there in winter.
What *enipla said, except that we’ve only got one ski area (two mountains, one resort) but a lot of tourists who have no idea how to drive in winter. You would think if they ski, they would have an idea of how to drive in the white stuff. You would be wrong.
We also have a screaming busy summer season, which is in full swing at the moment, with the the tourists plus the part-time locals (lots of second homes around here, some get occupied in the summer, some in the winter depending). The area depends on it and all but it’s sure a relief when they leave for awhile in spring and fall.
I spent a lot of time in the Judicial Committee of the House of Lords as well as in in the Royal Courts of Justice. The former was a major tourist hub, the latter near touristy areas and being such a lovely forbidding neo-gothic building had gawking tourists outside all the time.
I remember once during a break I neglected to de robe and came out for fresh air and was promptly snapped by loads of tourists. I am pretty sure that in the far east that snap is the generic picture for “British Barrister”.
I thought it was all Hungry Jack’s in Australia? 
I live/work near Niagara Falls, NY. Da Falls are beautiful, end of story. They’re testament to the fact that some things are so great they can’t be screwed up despite everyone’s best efforts.
The city itself, well…it’s suffered horribly. The NF used to have a lot of industry because the hydroelectric plant pumped out cheap power. The plant still does that, but now most of the power goes down to NYC because the industry is gone, as have most of the people. At its peak Niagara Falls was home to 360,000 people; now it’s more like 55,000. There are entire neighborhoods that have been abandoned. Also, some time in the 70’s the local government decided that they were going to build a tourism district close to the Falls. They bought up several blocks of perfectly good residential housing, tore it down, then realized they didn’t have enough money left to build anything. So those areas still sit empty today. There are also amazingly deluxe buildings very near the Falls which one would think would make a killing as luxury hotels. But nobody wants to stay on the American side, so they sit empty and unused.
So living and working near Niagara Falls, NY is really like living near any city of abandoned industry, sadly. There are some very good Indian restaurants here now, because a lot of tourists from India come to visit. There’s even a samosa truck near the Falls. One keeps waiting for the city to turn around–because of its location between the lakes Niagara Falls gets very little snow at all, and limitless hydro power and clean water have to be an attraction to industry eventually–but it doesn’t seem likely for some time.
I live just a few blocks from Lambeau Field. And Green Bay doesn’t have the infrastructure to deal with the tens of thousands of people leaving the stadium all at once.
On game days I just plan on not leaving the house if I can. If I have to work or something, I make sure I leave at a time other than immediately before or for an hour or so after. It’s insane. And the drunks, oh, the drunks.
Was that in Brisbane Princhester? I’m curious: what was the building that was singled out to be the backdrop for all of those hundreds of tourists’ photos? The City Hall?
Some are. There was a lawsuit about the name. Now you get a mix of both. The one at Circular Quay is a BK. The one on Pitt Street is a Hungry Jacks. I don’t know what determines which name they use now.
I kinda hate the Yankees, or possibly just their fans, because on a game day it would add a half hour to the commute if I was taking the 4 train, sometimes they were drunk enough to pull the emergency brake, (for ‘fun’), and if you’re thinking of driving anywhere on a highway in the Bronx, things are so interconnected around I-95 that a little traffic on anything causes delay north and south bound on the Deegan, I-95, and if it’s bad enough the Bronx River too.
Got it in one. Walking across King George Square past City Hall. Personally I wouldn’t have wasted film on a photo of City Hall, but there you go.
It’s not a tourist attraction, per se, but I live close to the Carlisle Fairgrounds in PA that hosts car shows. These are not little, local shows but major shows that bring in a lot of people from across the country. I’m too lazy and tired to look it up now, but I have complained about the traffic in the Pit. The traffic this year is going to be worse because of some brain fart called the “road diet” that turned two two-lane streets into two one-lane streets with bike and turn lanes.
This year’s Corvette show is promising to be a doozy, though. Chevrolet is going to introduce a new color named after our little burg, and Corvette show attendance is supposed to triple. Since the Corvette show coincides with the local college’s move-in weekend, it’s entirely possible that I won’t be able to leave the house. Thank Og it’s just the one weekend. If it were like this every weekend, I’d move.
Living in London I’ve become sort of ‘tourist blind’ - they are so ubiquitous that they just merge into the general hubbub. London’s such a heave of humanity that they just don’t stand out. Apart from when I’m on the Tube at the weekends, when the tourists take over the transport networks and dramatically slow down my progress.
It’s also very easy to avoid the crowds, as tourists generally gather in relatively small and predictable places – you can walk two streets away from Big Ben and not see a tourist. I hated working just off Oxford Street, however, as the place is mobbed 18 hours a day with tourists and shoppers which just makes it hard to walk anywhere at pace. Gives me the walking equivalent of road rage.
I DO love living in such an eventful place though, with every celebration, march or riot in spitting distance of my home or workplace. Life is never dull.
This brings back good memories..I worked at Circular Quay for few years before we moved our office out of CBD. I used to drive to work and park at the Opera House car park.
One fine morning last year I drove in to the car park only to find the place is packed with people changing clothes. I had absolutely no idea what was going and drove up and down the car park for 1 hour trying to find a parking spot. Once I got out of the car park only I found out that they had this going on that chilly morning.
That’s why I have never walked there in several years. Some parts of Stockholm are like that as well, especially at weekends, and you’ll never catch me there.
Hi, my name is flodnak, and I grew up in sigh “Pennsylvania Dutch Country”.
The tourist crowds got steadily worse during my childhood, both in number and in the length of time the crowds lasted. I blame that frickin’ Witness movie, I’m telling you.
You get used to it, unless you’re Amish, in which case I don’t know how you’d ever get used to being treated like a living tourist attraction. For us “English”, it’s just a matter of avoiding the tourist areas. If we want to go to a touristy place, say take our kids to Dutch Wonderland (local amusement park) or go shopping at the outlets, we go on Mondays or Tuesdays… for some reason, there are fewer tourists around those days. Of course, we also learn quickly which outlets are worth it and which are tourist traps… You learn the detours around the busy roads, and when they’re worth it. But there’s always a certain amount of irritation, particularly when you know that the people being gawked at would like nothing better than to be left ALONE.
Now, I live outside Oslo, which is a stop for tourists on their way to the fjords - sometimes whole cruise ships of them at a time. But it doesn’t strike me as nearly as bad, here. In fact, it can be amusing, because tourists frequently peg me as a native Norwegian 
There’s Norway I’d go Oslo as saying you were Norwegian, flodnak.
I grew up in a ski town. OH how I loved watching people try to drive their rental Camry’s through 8" of fresh snow whilst wearing their ski boots. I also enjoyed hearing people ask “Where’s the wine section?” at the grocery store. Welcome to Utah!, I’d say.
Tourists never really bothered me, unless I was up on the slopes, and they were congregating in walkways and asking me “Wait, you actually live here?” It’s not Disneyland, people!
I managed the BestBuy across the street from the Daytona Speedway for 6 years.
During race week we blocked off most of our parking lot and sold parking spaces. For the Daytona 500 we sold parking spots for $50 and took the staff down to 5 people. Weeks prior we ordered tons extra of binoculars, radio scanners, cameras, etc.
I rode my motorcycle to work and took an off-road route back home everyday riding under power lines.
During races and practices the cars are so loud you could hear them from inside the store.
I always liked working late during the Rolex 24 cause you’d come out of work around 1 a.m. and the immediate area was still and not a soul around. But across the street the raceway glowed and you’d just listen to all the various model race cars doing laps on the road course.
I used to work at 5th & Mission, in that square building with the ivy tucked in between the parking garage and the new hotel. It was fortunate that most of the Moscone foot traffic stayed on 4th, but the line of cars trying to get into the garage was crazy. Every so often, I’d see a head-on crash caused by some idiot who thought they were exempt from traffic laws and sharply angled curbs who’d try going the wrong way down the alley. If they avoided oncoming traffic, they were then doomed to attempting a three-or-more-point turn in order to navigate the angled entrance.
At the height of tourist season, I could count on getting asked for directions while waiting for the light to change at 5th and Market. They’d want the most obvious places like the cable car turnaround (Right over there where all those people are lined up), Nordstrom (Through those doors, then go up the escalator), Moscone Center (Walk two blocks that way, then turn left and go one block) and even Market Street itself. Half the time, the answer to that one was “You’re on it.”
It’s tourist season. Why can’t we shoot them? 
This. It’s kind of funny, people are sometimes surprised that there are local residents. Um…we don’t all just drive up from Denver every day.