Can Hawaii improve tourism? Chime in and add your comments.
37 thoughts on “Maui Won’t Stop New Hotels While Honolulu Looks At Visitor Curbs”
Comments are closed.
Home » Blog » Hawaii Travel Tips » Maui Won’t Stop New Hotels While Honolulu Looks At Visitor Curbs
I prefer a beach front country feel to my Hawaii experience and I am not a resort girl. I like to take my family and get a beach front house and enjoy more nature and less people. I hike, swim, paddle board, enjoy trees and ocean, sunrise and sunset. I don’t like cities. I also can’t manage to spend a month. 3-5 days or a week is all we can manage to get away from work, being a contractor. Any longer and the work will no longer be there when we get back. I feel like the changes in laws are forcing visitors into cities or resorts and that’s not the kind of experience I need. I don’t know the answers to all the complicated problems facing Hawaii tourism, and I’m thankful for the good experiences I’ve had there. I may not keep coming back if I have to stay in the city, resort, or condo complex.
There’s an abtruse reality that discrimination is acceptable in some cases but not others.
Charging nonresidents to visit public places is absolutely discriminatory. If you’re going to charge people, charge everyone and charge less. It’s ironic that most people accept these types of discriminations without question, yet loathing protest and even riot, if it’s perceived as racial or racially motivated. 🤷🏽♂️
I think it’s long past due for a reckoning of Hawaii travel. Start with the aggressive airlines constantly increasing number of flights. Airfare wars really are a terrible thing for Hawaii. A hotel construction moratorium sounds good too. I like being able to rent private homes but everyone needs to follow the same rules. Limit number of cruises and tour buses too! I have loved both living in and visiting Hawaii for 50 years and I’m very sad about the current state of tourism.Too much for too long will destroy everything.
We are on Ouahu right now. We spent a week at Waikiki and we’re on our second week up on the North Shore. Waikiki is crazy busy. Make dinner reservations at least two months before you come. Make all of your activity reservations months before you come. Everything is sold out and if there’s a place there’s a line around the block. The North Shore is busy but not crazy busy like Waikiki… And the food trucks are awesome, we keep visiting different ones and have not been disappointed once yet! We did not brave Giovanni’s shrimp truck because the line was so long but most other places the lines are short… Unless you want shaved ice then you’re standing in a long line.
Too many people on Maui. It was truly paradise in the 70s and 80s. By 2000 too many people and now just a crying shame. Visitors DO need to be limited. No more new hotels and crack down on illegal rentals is a MUST.
Hoping also that other vacation spots open soon and a raise in airfare will help remedy the problem as well. Mahalo for always keeping us well informed…kamaaina and visitors as well.
Hi Chris.
Thanks for your input on this and your dozens of comments.
Aloha.
Your article referenced AirB&B, and when AirB&B and VRBO first started, we stayed in so many charming properties in Hawaii. Owners made a point to make them inviting and unique. Cooking supplies were stocked, sometimes you’d receive a basket of local fruit and a bag of coffee to get started. You would have good beach chairs and good snorkel equipment. Many of the properties were on farms, or a “tiny house” (700 sq. ft.)on a larger property. Owners were friendly and went out of their way to make you feel wanted.
Those places have virtually disappeared! Cramped condos abound. VRBO stands for Vacation Rentals by Owner, not rental agencies yet they are there. They creatively double dip in their fees, charging owners fees for listing the property and charging the renters a “convenience fee”. We have always talked with the owners when questions came up, not VRBO – that would be inconvenient! Many owners are now charging high rents with uncomfortable furnishings. I miss the old days.
Maui has gotten so built up, if they keep adding the hotels and resorts, I don’t see how the infrastructure will support it.
I appreciate the concern the leaders and citizens have about protecting the Islands from mass, unbridled tourism. It’s a fine line, though. HI lives on tourism. Best of luck on developing strategies and keep getting feedback from tourists so you can monitor and adjust.
For Maui, or any of the islands, it seems that there needs to be a mix of vacation rental options. There should be houses available, as well as condos and hotel rooms. That, to me, means that the whole accommodation industry needs to develop an overarching strategy that melds well with the highway, transportation, restaurant, grocery industries. If one regulates just one piece (assuming that action is legal) some other sector will take up the slack.
Covid, with the lack of travel, should have demonstrated not only the “need” for visitors but what sectors were most impacted. The restart should have shown, too, where continued weakness lies.
We travel to Hawaii often to see family, and attend board meetings for our condo, but I’ve never seen it as crowded as it was in June. Perhaps that’s because we don’t usually travel there during summer months, or maybe it was due to pent up travel from COVID, or maybe it was really just that crowded in the Waikiki area. Our son avoids Waikiki due to the crowds, and I can understand that. I think putting a reservation process in place for popular sites would be a boon to both locals (it would reduce crowds), and tourists (it would cut wait times). I’m not sure HTA is the organization to do this, as it hasn’t been very successful in the past. It would require capable, stable leadership, and that hasn’t been there for a long time. Once other areas open for travel the problem may solve itself, and then Hawaii will be looking for new ways to attract more visitors!
Hi Lee.
Thanks for your many comments and input on this important issue.
Aloha.
Aloha! I agree with Lee S. When international travel opens up, there will be less people going to Hawaii. My family and friends that have been planning to go to Europe & Asia have opted to go Hawaii instead due to restrictions. It’s easier for mainlanders to get to Hi especially for fully vaccinated individuals and everybody has been longing to go on vacation. I always check out BOH to get updates on Hi travel and I love reading comments from other readers. Have a safe and enjoyable summer everyone.
Hi Inah.
Thanks for your comments. Happy travels.
Aloha.
Here they go again. Mismanagement and limits on tourism will only cause less tourists to visit and spend money. A continuation of hurtful political policies in the islands. Heres an idea build more eco friendly hotels with covid funds
I don’t understand … you talk about how everything is hurting tourism in Hawaii, and yet I read all the time that tourism is up and a lot of complaints about overcrowding, etc. So, which is it? I think the problem is that crowds are up, and that issue needs to be addressed. The question is, how to best address the issue, not if the issue exists.
Joerg thanks for the input.
I actually read that this is called revenge tourism. It’s probably temporary so hawaii should be taking action now. But i think it will wait and do as little as possible. The overcrowding happens because most places to stay are in the main cities on the islands. Nothing has been done about this issue before or after covid, which is why im complaining about it.
CF,
Revenge tourism! I just called it “pent-up demand”. in either case, it looks like an increase in travel is here to stay, at least for the foreseeable future. I think that there are a couple of issues that need to be addressed in Hawaii. First, as you say, all the hotels are in the “tourist areas”, and traffic there gets really bad. The hotel moratorium is a reaction to that problem. But I’m not sure that’s going to roll back the problems that already exist. the second issue is the fact of overcrowding at popular locations for tourists. The issue here isn’t just parking. It’s the fact that just that many people has a negative impact on the very locations that are so beautiful and if something isn’t done, they won’t be so beautiful anymore. It’s a difficult issue since Hawaii is so dependant on tourism, and yet, that tourism is destroying the very reason people are coming there. Overall, no matter what the government does, it’s going to make someone unhappy.