Sintra residents say the Portuguese town is turning into an ‘amusement park’ and ‘guerrilla action is needed’

Natalie Wilson

Lisbon: Residents in one picturesque Portuguese town are protesting to protect its historic centre in an ongoing battle against overtourism.

For years, summer tourism to Sintra’s Unesco world heritage site has threatened to overwhelm residents, with congested traffic preventing locals from running everyday errands in the town centre.

Local association QSintra says that traffic and disrespectful tourists have made Sintra, to the west of Lisbon, a “congested amusement park” and are calling on the council to take action.

QSintra’s manifesto said: “To all who live in Sintra and to all who like to visit it, Sintra is in danger. It is urgent to defend Sintra and the Serra [mountain range], their heritage and their identity.”

Last weekend the group placed posters in the area that read ‘Sintra: a traffic jam in paradise’ and compared the town to Disneyland, while other messages promised to hold Camara Municipal de Sintra, the municipal governing body, “accountable for sustainable policies with measurable outcomes”.

“Sintra belongs to everyone and needs everyone,” says the association which is protesting for quality rather than quantity tourism.

One British resident told The Times that emergencies would be “frightening” for fire engines or ambulances trying to navigate gridlocked traffic on the narrow medieval streets.

According to the publication, in the face of inaction from the authorities, a member of a resident group said “guerrilla action is needed”.

Another local said she wakes up at 5am every day to walk her dogs in “peace and quiet” before the stampedes of tourists arrive, in an interview with SIC TV News.

QSintra said in a statement: “We want Sintra and the people of Sintra to be able to live with tourism, but a type of tourism that respects and improves the lives of those who live here and does not, on the contrary, harm their daily lives and make them flee from what remains of their own life in the neighbourhoods, in the mountains and the surrounding area up to the Atlantic coast.

“Mechanisms must be created to discourage mass tourism, flash tourist visits, and the flow of people that congest monuments, access roads and public spaces.”

Over 350 Sintra citizens recently signed a protest against the construction of a new hotel and car park in the town’s historic centre that QSintra called “an attack on the cultural landscape”.

The protest follows a string of similar anti-tourist demonstrations across Europe this summer.

Thousands protested in Spain’s Palma de Mallorca last Sunday in the latest demonstration against overtourism.