Tulum Councilman Calls for Rethinking Tourism Development

Tulum, Quintana Roo — With Tulum preparing to host the World Wellness Weekend, City Councilman Jorge Alberto Portilla Manica has called for a rethink of the destination’s development model, arguing that the current one has left the city with too many tourist services and too little public infrastructure.

Speaking at a meeting of the Business Coordinating Council, a business group chaired by Patricia de la Torre, Portilla said the city needs to recalibrate. “We need to rethink development. Right now we have oversupply and low demand for tourism services,” he said. “The time has come to address pressing needs that help consolidate our destination, such as guaranteeing quality medical services.”

The councilman said the gap between supply and demand is undercutting the city. “Today we have much more supply than demand, and together with low visitor numbers, that makes the destination cheaper,” he explained. He called for lower densities, higher quality and a different kind of tourism offering.

Portilla also criticized the proliferation of vacation rentals. He described a chaotic oversupply — more than 20,000 short-term rental rooms — and said the people who built and sold them have already left, leaving officials with the consequences. He invited attendees to work toward planned, orderly urban development “with all the services and infrastructure we need.”

“We have been following an economic model without a plan,” he said. “We focused on economic gain rather than ensuring we have hospitals and medical services to care for tourists and citizens.”