Tourist Gentrification of Retail Shops in Palma (Majorca)

Abstract

[eng] This chapter analyses the processes behind the restructuring of the retail landscape in the city of Palma, the capital city of Majorca (Spain), where tourist visitation is of nearly 12 million annually. Here, the transformation of retail shops is linked with the occurrence of overtourism and its contribution to commercial gentrification. First, it is hypothesized that Majorca's changing commercial structure and the impacts of overtourism have materialized in the form of (i) gentrification; (ii) the boutiquing of the main streets; and (iii) extending the boundaries of gentrification into the side and secondary streets. The second hypothesis is that a double phenomenon is occurring in these secondary streets. On the one hand, there is disinvestment and closure of local retail shops; and, on the other, reinvestment is converting them either into new gentrified shops or into dwellings.