Kyoto losing its luster as a school trip destination as tourist crowds continue to swell

Report says schools are looking at alternatives to the traditional top school trip destination.

When asked why he’d stopped dining at a restaurant he used to frequent, Yogi Berra famously answered “Nobody goes there anymore. It’s too crowded.” It’s one of many famous quotes from the Hall of Fame baseball player and manager that’s colorful but not-quite sensical, and yet it might actually be applicable to Kyoto, at least with one demographic.

In Japan, there’s a custom of shugaku ryokou, or “school trips.” These aren’t class trips to celebrate graduation, but multi-day school-administered travels taken in the middle of the school year, usually to sites of historical or cultural importance.

If “history and culture” has you immediately thinking of Kyoto, Japan’s former capital, you’re not alone. Statistics from Japan’s Educational Tour Institute showing that in 2022 Kyoto was the top destination for school trips for middle schools in Japan, followed by Nara and Osaka, which like Kyoto are part of Japan’s Kinki region. Osaka and Kyoto were also the number-one and number-two destinations, respectively, for high schools’ school trips, with Nara ranking fifth.

The institute’s research also shows that in 2023 roughly 90 percent of public middle schools in Japan’s eastern Kanto region (which includes the country’s two most populous cities, Tokyo and Yokohama) took their school trips to Kinki. However, the majority of Kanto middle schools, 54 percent of them, say that they are considering avoiding Kinki for future trips, with growing tourist crowds believed to be a major reason why.

With the yen continuing to be extremely weak against other currencies, Japan is seeing record numbers of inbound foreign tourists, and many of them are spending a large chunk of their time in Kyoto, whose shrines, temples, and preserved historical districts are an undeniably alluring look at Japan’s traditional culture, whether it’s someone’s first of fifth visit to Japan. But with Kyoto’s major attractions being old buildings, it’s not like they can simply expand them to absorb mushrooming tourist numbers, and the result is that many of Kyoto’s most famous landmarks, which are also often the ones of greatest historical significance, have become very crowded.

The concern for schools isn’t so much that a bunch of noisy tourists might spoil the popular-image tranquility of Kyoto’s temples and shrines, but that the logistic problems larger crowds create. Overcrowding can make it difficult for school groups to gain admission to historical sites or navigate them in a timely manner, reducing the number of sites that can be visited on the trip. The tourism boom is also causing hotel prices in Kyoto to soar, which can’t be making things easier for schools trying to stick to a reasonable budget for their trips. Staying farther away from the Kyoto city center can alleviate costs, but with the tradeoff of longer transit times from the lodgings to historical sites, again lessening the educational potential of the trip.

So while Kyoto isn’t likely to run out of tourists any time soon, it’s likely that fewer kids will be seeing the city on their school trips.

Source: Yomiuri Shimbun via Itai News
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