譯/李京倫
分散旅遊興起 鼓勵你朝人少處去
The hike to Hanging Lake, just east of Glenwood Springs, Colorado, is short and steep, rising more than 1,000 feet in just over 1 mile. The payoff vista — an idyllic turquoise pool fed by waterfalls, ringed in evergreens and seemingly hanging off the edge of a cliff — has been known to attract up to 1,500 hikers on a busy day.
懸湖緊鄰美國科羅拉多州格倫伍德溫泉市東緣，健行到懸湖的路程短而陡峭，僅略多於1哩（1.6公里），海拔升幅卻逾千呎（305公尺）。路途終點的美景是詩情畫意的藍綠色池塘，有瀑布注入，常綠植物圍繞，而且看似浮在懸崖邊，美景如斯，吸引之遊客多時一日可達1500人。
It's too many for the fragile ecosystem. To regulate traffic, the U.S. Forest Service, with the city of Glenwood Springs, this year implemented a permit requirement ($12), limiting visitors to 600 a day between May 1 and Oct. 31.
1500人對這脆弱的生態系統來說太多了。為了控管人流量，美國國家森林局與格倫伍德溫泉市府合作，今年起要求遊客買票入場，一人12美元，並在5月1日到10月31日之間，將每日遊客總數限制在600人以內。
Ticketed entry and visitor quotas have long been leading solutions to tame the tourist crowds threatening to overwhelm attractions from Machu Picchu in Peru to, more recently, Dubrovnik, Croatia.
購票入場和限制遊客總量，一直是緩解大量遊客湧入、防止景點不堪負荷的首選方法。從秘魯印加帝國遺跡馬丘比丘，到近期的克羅埃西亞南部港市杜布羅夫尼克，都有遊客量超過景點負荷的問題。
Now, many other popular tourist destinations are trying a new tactic to maintain their tourism numbers without disturbing the attractions that draw them in the first place: positive redirection. Across the globe, travel providers and government agencies are responding to overtourism with suggestions for less-crowded places and quieter seasons in hopes of producing a broader but lighter footprint.
現在，許多其他熱門景點正在嘗試新策略，既要維持遊客量，又不擾亂最初吸引他們前來的景點，那就是積極引導遊客往別處去。全球各地的旅行社和政府機構為了解決超限旅遊的問題，都建議旅客，在旺季以外的時間，往人潮較少的地方去，希望旅客造訪的範圍更廣，對環境的衝擊則降低。
In Colorado's case, the tourism office's online Colorado Field Guide outlines 150 multiday itineraries with the goal of dispersing its 82 million travelers across the seasons and across the state.
在科羅拉多州這個例子中，旅遊局線上的「科羅拉多旅遊指南」列出150種多日遊行程，希望把該州共8200萬人次的旅客分散在各個季節、各個地方。
Expanding when and where to go mirrors the rise of tourism, linked to the growth of the middle class in emerging markets. From 25 million travelers in the 1950s, tourist arrivals around the world grew to 1.4 billion in 2018, and the World Tourism Organization forecasts that number to rise to 1.8 billion by 2030.
擴大旅遊地點和時段的選擇範圍，反映出旅遊活動日益盛行，這與新興市場中產階級崛起有關。全球旅客人次1950年代是2500萬，2018年已增至14億，聯合國世界旅遊組織預估，到2030年將增為18億。
In the United States, 60% of travelers believe overcrowding will have a significant impact on destinations they choose within the next five to 10 years, according to the 2019 Portrait of American Travelers survey, conducted by the hospitality marketing firm MMGY Global.
根據餐旅業行銷公司「MMGY環球」做的「2019年美國旅客群像調查」，美國六成旅客認為，人滿為患會在未來五到十年內大大影響他們對目的地的選擇。
A wave of travel companies - new and established - are lining up to help them make that choice in the interest of destination sustainability as well as peace of mind.
不論是新成立的旅行社或既有的大旅行社，都準備協助旅客選擇旅遊地點，既不讓景點負荷過重，又能讓旅客身心放鬆。
"As a tour operator, I think it's our responsibility to help expand people's places of interest," said Jason Wertz, a former art dealer who founded Uncovr Travel in 2018. The tour company specializes in less-visited areas and trips often go in shoulder seasons when, Wertz added, "there are less people and you get a more authentic experience."
維爾茲曾是藝術品經銷商，去年創辦Uncovr旅行社，他說：「身為旅行業者，我們的責任就是讓旅客對更多景點感興趣。」這家旅行社專門帶旅客到人潮較少的景點，出發時間往往介於旺季與淡季之間，維爾茲說：「這種時間遊客較少，你會有更真切的體驗。」
說文解字看新聞
全球許多旅遊景點都有超限旅遊（overtourism，亦稱過度旅遊）的問題，本文討論解決這個問題的新方法。
overtourism一詞首見於2012年，但直到2017年夏天才在媒體上頻頻曝光，因為那時，住在景點附近的居民首次大規模抗議遊客太多。
超限旅遊跟「承載力」（carrying capacity）有關，承載力是指一個地方能接待的最大數量遊客；另外也跟「過度擁擠」（overcrowding）有關，這是指太多人造訪同一處，導致不安全或不舒服。
為什麼會有超限旅遊的問題？旅遊業跟其他許多產業一樣，幾乎只關心成長（growth），不關心對環境的衝擊（impacts），經過數十年毫無控制的成長後，製造的問題比帶來的好處還多。本文的footprint是「足跡」的引申義：對環境的影響。
undertourism這個詞比overtourism新，在本文中的用法是引導遊客到比較不熱門的景點。
shoulder season是淡季與旺季之間。off-season是淡季，在美國還可指體育上的「賽季之間」，淡季還有其他說法，如slack season、low season、dull season。如果用slack這個字，是強調工作量少或比較不忙，如果用low這個字，是強調生產力或利潤較低。
旺季可以說peak season、high season或busy season。
