“If I’m an advocate for anything, it’s to move. As far as you can, as much as you can. Across the ocean, or simply across the river. The extent to which you can walk in someone else’s shoes or at least eat their food, it’s a plus for everybody. Open your mind, get up off the couch, move.”

--Anthony Bourdain

My general recipe for travel is as follows: I want to see cool architecture, I want to eat good food, and I want to get a local sense for the place. Meaning, I'd ideally like to hang out with locals and learn from them. What's it really like, here?

Because of this, I've never been one to over schedule on trips. There will be things I absolutely want to see and do, but I always want to make sure that there's time for the unknown.

I think you want to walk into places that you don't have on your list, sit at the bar, and have a conversation with the person behind it. You will learn things, and maybe it'll set you on a travel journey that you couldn't have possibly planned back home.

That said, guides are still helpful for things like architecture and food. But I have never found general purpose guides -- like the ones from Frommer's -- to be of any use. They have too much information that isn't curated.

When I was in my early 20s, I used to use the Wallpaper* City Guides. They were small. I would mark them up as I went. And they gave me the list of must-see architecture. More recently, I've been relying on Monocle's Travel Guides. They're great too.

But I am now also a fan of Toronto-based ÅVONTUURA and the architecture guides that they produce. They are simple and beautiful pamphlets that give you a map of each city; a breakdown of contemporary, modern, and historic architecture; a recommended route through the city; and a full list of the important buildings, including their architects.

The founder of Avontuura, Karl van Es, was kind enough to send me their entire set, which as of this month includes new guides for Amsterdam, Berlin, Singapore, and Toronto. Thank you, Karl.

I'm now looking forward to trying one of these out on a future trip. I'm going to use it to decide what architecture I want to visit and, for the rest, I'll just do what I normally like to do -- wing it.

P.S. It took me multiple attempts of tossing these guides onto my kitchen counter in order to arrive at the above photo. I hope you like it.

Cities are complicated. And we have spoken before about how it can sometimes feel like they never really reach homeostasis. In extreme cases, it might seem like they're either decaying and losing people, or they're too successful.

I was reminded of this again this morning while reading an article about how Rome's historic city center is being overrun with Airbnbs and tourists, and how it is pushing out the locals. It has, arguably, become too successful as a tourist destination.

Of course, this problem isn't unique to Rome. Venice has the same thing going on, though probably to a greater extent. And Amsterdam is currently working to attract more highbrow tourists and to move their red light district out of the city center.

But the question I have is: What's the right amount of tourism? If 25,000 listings is too many for Rome, what's the right number? And do cities ever really achieve homeostasis, where, you know, things feel just right? Here's an excerpt from the above article that describes what parts of Rome were like before the tourism boom:

Ms. Rapaccini remembers when Monti was a quiet, authentic haven for arty types and locals. She and her late partner, the film director Mario Monicelli, who received six Oscar nominations, moved to Monti in 1988. The area was unfashionable, dirty and full of prostitutes, but beautiful in its gritty way, “like a little village” even though it was in the heart of a big, bustling city, she recalls. The apartments were cheap and the area began to attract film types, journalists and artisans – none of them rich – who mixed easily with local workers and shop owners.

It's a romantic description of what sounds like a pretty gritty area. Unfashionable, dirty, and full of prostitutes is apparently better than full of annoying American tourists. And perhaps it is. But then what was the area like before it was unfashionable, dirty, and full of prostitutes? Was that also better?

I have no idea. But cities are constantly changing and evolving, and they were doing it long before any of us arrived, especially in the case of an ancient city like Rome. Maybe that's what makes it so difficult to hang onto that exact moment in time when everything was just right.

Chart: Globe and Mail

Back in 2014, Amsterdam became the first city to have what is referred to as a "night mayor." And at the time, including here on this blog, this was generally viewed as a pretty progressive thing to do. It recognized that there is an important nighttime economy and that, with the right leadership, it be harnessed for broader economic development purposes. As a result, many cities followed suit and appointed their own night mayors. (Toronto did not, despite my repeated posts.)

But fast forward to today and things feel different. Night mayors aren't talked about as much in city building circles. And Amsterdam is actually trying to limit overall tourism growth. It is working to relocate its Red Light District to outside of the city center and it hopes to reduce the amount of people who come to the city just to misbehave. To be clear, it still wants tourists; it just wants more people who do things like go to museums:

The Netherlands’ capital plans to launch a deterrence campaign later this month aimed at tourists who go wild during their visits. In addition to new ads, the city has proposed rules in its infamous Red Light District, such as a ban on smoking marijuana in the street, earlier weekend closing times for bars, clubs and sex-work establishments and reduced alcohol sales. 

Amsterdam’s liberal rules for drugs and prostitution have long attracted travelers looking to let loose, but officials say they are taking it too far and harming the quality of life for residents. 

This is an interesting situation because usually the problem is, "how do we get more tourists to come and visit our city? Should we maybe build a casino or a Ferris wheel or something else equally as big?" Instead, the problem here is, "we have way too many drunk and annoying tourists. How do we swap them for more cultured visitors?" Of course, one solution is to just tell people that they are annoying and that they should stop coming. And that's generally what the ad campaigns plan to do.

An alternative approach might be to celebrate all of the other things that one can do in Amsterdam.