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Some species of pines have cones that remain closed for years, only opening when the temperature is very high. They store seeds that will burst out in case of fire and remain fertile afterwards.
In this way, the tree has developed a specific mechanism to increase the survival of its species. The pine coexists well with heat, but it is also prepared for when there is excessive blaze.
This is similar to Menorca’s relationship with tourism. The island coexists well with visitors, who generate an economy that benefits the local population. Until touristification becomes excessive: pressure on the territory degrades the environment and resources, and harmony with residents is lost. Then comes the phase of blaze, and it is necessary to foresee, as the pines have done, strategies to ensure survival.
This is not as simple as declaring it. Philosophers already warn that it is better to try to live according to what we think, because otherwise we end up thinking according to how we live. When Menorca stops thinking about how it wants to be (and, therefore, how it wants to evolve), we enter a stage where thoughts are no more than adaptations —increasingly desperate— to a reality we did not desire, but that ends up being imposed.
When institutions propose expanding car parks to fight beach overcrowding (as one of the Island Territorial Plan modifications does), we are facing a reality that thinks us.
The idea of quality in the tourist experience is abandoned, the concept of carrying capacity is renounced, and the Biosphere Reserve framework is abdicated. The territory is placed at the service of abuse.
Similarly, agencies that help offenders act the same way. Legalizing swimming pools when what had been authorized was groundwater savings is a genuflection. A form of subordination that refuses to look further. It is the aforementioned adaptation to reality, without thinking about consequences or alternatives.
Setting limits on the island’s resources is no different from what is already done in the city: parking is not allowed everywhere, there are speed limits, time restrictions for noise, rules for waste disposal… These are restrictions established to make coexistence possible under decent conditions.
For decades, human pressure has been increasing in Menorca’s summers, revealing the problem of so-called tourist season extension. Adding visitors at the beginning and end of the season may be possible, but we are failing to reduce numbers in the central months. Pretending this dynamic can be sustained over time is, again, like wearing blinders.
The discomfort already visible on the island makes it urgent to apply effective measures to limit the summer peak. Restricting tourist vehicles is a feasible measure to achieve this. Reducing cars can lower human pressure. A way to survive when the blaze is excessive. And to think the island instead of being thought by it.
(This text is an adaptation of the original article published by Miquel Camps, as coordinator of territorial policy for the GOB, in the Menorca newspaper on 01/09/2025).