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A scenic spot in Hawaii has been taken over by social media influencers who are ignoring basic safety rules in their quest for photo-stealing holiday snaps.
Officials at the Tiomaluhea Botanical Gardens on Oahu said visitors are ignoring “no photography” and “no parking” signs “for the sake of ‘photography'” in order to get the perfect photo.
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They say the viral photo op is the reason visitor numbers have doubled — from less than 250,000 in 2017 to 555,000 in 2022. Joshlyn Sand, director of the Honolulu Botanical Garden, told the SFGATE news website: “It’s still a huge problem. People will ignore the signs. They’ll pose right next to the signs (prohibiting certain activities).
She said Instagram users and other influencers blocked the entrance, “and there was a lot of traffic. It’s a shared road. It’s very narrow. There’s no bike lane. There’s no sidewalk, so you might be sharing the road with two cars, strollers, pedestrians and cyclists, so photography is not accessible to this area.”
She said the issue had now become a “headache”, adding that there had been a number of “near misses”.
“No one was hurt as far as I know, but there have definitely been troubles before,” she told the outlet.
To address traffic congestion, the Honolulu Parks and Recreation Department is considering charging admission to the 162-hectare botanical garden, which is previously free.
This isn’t the first time authorities have taken action to curb social media groups. Last year, a small town in Vermont was forced to take drastic measures to curb overtourism after “leaf peepers” blocked residents and emergency vehicles from accessing a dirt road that offered stunning views of the leaves.
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