Well, that was apparently the visitor count on September 29, 1932, according to the Honolulu Star-Bulletin of that date.
Although they refer to tourists “in Hawaii,” the article seems clear that they’re talking about Honolulu, and likely Waikiki in particular. Apparently there weren’t many visitors traveling to the neighbor islands at that time.
Just click on the clipping to see a larger version.
It’s a lot different today.
According to preliminary data gathered by the state Department of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism, the average daily visitor count for Oahu during the three months of 2019 was 114,165.
Lee Cataluna was right on point with her recent column in the Honolulu Star-Advertiser about all the illegal transient vacation rentals in our neighborhoods. The Legislature voted to collect taxes from them. Cataluna replies that local residents want to stop them, not tax them.
Here’s a part of her column.
Are Hawaii residents mad because vacation rentals aren’t kicking in their share of state taxes?
No. That’s not what you hear. That’s not what people post online about the strangers coming and going at the house next door or the all-night parties down the street in the house that used to be a home for actual neighbors, not transients. That’s not what they talk about with their friends when they say, “I don’t even know whose car is parked in front of my house!”
It’s not, “Make them pay!” It’s “Make them stop!” Nobody who lives with these illegal hostels on their street or across the fence is worried much about them paying taxes. Nobody who has to jockey for parking or deal with the lights on all night or watch as strangers take pictures of their backyard plants is asking for money.
They want their peace and privacy back. They want actual neighbors to be their neighbors, people they can get to know, who can cat-sit for them when they go on trips and who will call them at work when they see something amiss and say, “Hey, Barbara, you left your side gate open. Want me to close it for you?”
Hawaii residents want tourists to go back to all the vast prime beachfront that our kupuna saw taken away and paved over, built up and maximized for tourism. That was the unspoken deal, that we would give up Waikiki and Poipu and Lahaina and Wailea to the tourist machine but keep the country country and the neighborhoods neighborhoods. The deal has now been broken.
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“Gap Year” on Black-ish, season 5 episode 1 Premiered October 16, 2018, and draws attention to Air BB housing in residential neighborhoods. The episode does a good job of spot-lighting the Air BB type short term renting. I agree with Lee Cataluna’s column, the deal is broken. When I go home, I want peace and quiet but most of all predictability. Getting our share of tax won’t help. Thank you, Ian, for sharing this.
Vacation rentals are essentially commercial ventures in residential zones.
Auto repair shops are prohibited.
Why is a high-impact business, with adverse effects such as loss of parking and noise, allowed to operate?
Aren’t permits and special variants required?
I thought the deal was to give Ka’anapali to the tourist machine, not Lahaina, but it took over Lahaina anyway.
87 years latter 2,063 tourists with a growth factor of 55.33% becomes 114,165 . Looking 87 years in the future the number becomes at same rate around 6,313,324 daily! Of course population will be much larger as well. 2019 unimaginable in 1932.
The “deal” was broken early on in Maui. By the late 1970’s Kihei was already being claimed by the tourist industry. Now, even the public beach parks, not to mention residential neighborhoods, have been turned over to businesses catering to tourists.
It Was the “Hippies” who conquered Maui first. Like at North Shore and Windward, O’ahu in early 1960’s. Post “Beatnick”. Remember as a very young boy going for wedding luau in 1969 and they were settling in building shacks and A-frames out of junk. As they aged, became very industries dope growers, renters, shop owners, guru’s….entrepreneurs like the missionaries of long ago. And have continued to pillage Hawaii Nei forever more.
Not sure if I’m doing the math right, but we now have 10,000,000 tourists per year in Hawaii, spending an average of 10 days each. 100,000,000 days of tourists per year, divided by 365 days, means today we have nearly 274,000 tourists in Hawaii on any given day.
About 60% of the visitors go to Oahu, so we have roughly 160,000+ tourists on Oahu any given day. Which is a nearly 20% increase in our island population.
Apologies if I’m calculating incorrectly. I’d welcome corrections.
The average length of stay in Hawaii is 12.4 days around New Year’s Day, followed by 7.3 days in December and 4.8 days in mid-August. The most popular vacation length is exactly 7 days.
Using 7 days as an average, on any given day there are about 115,000 tourists on Oahu.