Overcrowded Vienna This Christmas?
Christmas market mayhem, is how I would describe my very recent visit to an overcrowded Vienna?
Please do not get me wrong. I really love Vienna and have visited nearly 30 times at all seasons of the year.
However, the chaos and pedestrian crushes around the city centre at this year I found, overwhelming.
Kartner Strasse in what seems to be overcrowded Christmas in Vienna.
Its popularity is now a tourism misfortune in my opinion. As there is no way you can enjoy the city at this special time of the year with the sheer number of visitors thronging its thoroughfares and market locations.
Great swathes of coach and river cruise boat parties like giant pedestrian waves sweep along the Graben or Kartner Strasse to St Stephan’s Platz. Here they wash up like beached whales and block whole areas of pavement as they surround their flag carrying guiding captains often four, five or sometimes six deep.
Stephansplatz in Vienna for my recent Christmas market period visit, but so overcrowded.
The impenetrable groups of mass visitors create whole no-go areas for couples or families hoping to absorb the magic of Christmas time in this charming city.
I find it hard for any person who was in or around the city centre over the last few days not to have found the whole event stultifying by the numbers of visitors in the city.
The magic of Christmas trees and lights along the The Graben Vienna, Austria.
As magical as Christmas can be here, this investment by the city and its many major market complex’s is being lost to its visitors by the sheer weight their numbers.
One of the Figlmuller entrances in a very crowded Christmas in Vienna.
A popular Viennese tourist restaurant appeared to be being besieged by visitors on two fronts. Both its entrances had many waiting queuing for tables in order to eat their ‘Weiner Schnitzel’, which is their speciality.
Another of the Figlmuller entrances in Vienna this December.
One thing Vienna is not short of is Schnitzel. I should know I have eaten it in dozens of different cafes over the years.
Yes, this particular restaurant does have an excellent reputation but ‘the great schnitzel siege of 2019’ was really not necessary. With probably a dozen other places nearby whom would have accommodated them all without the pavement crush outside their establishments!
Swathes of coach parties being escorted around a very crowded Christmas in Vienna.
Queueing for a place at the up-market Sacher Hotel where its particular speciality the Sacher Torte can be enjoyed in its luxury café. Quite a line there too.
Also, the density of tourists did seem to put pressure on the city toilets as a visit to the Stephan’s Platz ones found in the U station had a line running well out into the concourse so joining it was not an option plus not having the correct coinage to hand!
Another view of Stephansplatz in Vienna during my recent Christmas market visit!
Places like the Schonbrunn Palace this year I thought were extra busy. Perhaps the new coach parking facility alongside the palace is now making it too accessible. The tours appear to visit the other markets in turn around the city. The coach’s home in from literally most of Europe. Also, from the UK and from many Eastern European countries too.
One of the main shopping streets Kartner Strasse in Vienna during my visit.
Its hard to enjoy a warming gluwein and take in the festive feeling at each of the market locations if that magic is destroyed literally by tens of thousands of people trying to do the same.
Christmas market in Vienna.
There are many other quieter locations around the city where smaller more intimate markets are staged and should be sought out. Usually they are found around or near to a local church rather than at the Cathedral or Rathaus with its crowds and crushes. The latter does have an ice rink but the crowds still make the market stalls hard to view and enjoy.
However, I really do think that its time for the authorities to address this overcrowding issue?
Is it time for the city to realise that its popularity is now too prevalent?
Will it now have that Venice over-crowding factor attached to it?
The tourism income for the city appears to be through the roof. However, I would love for the city to do something before that Christmas market tourism experience crashes down. Rather like on occasions the ice skaters do on their bottoms!
