Marquette to tourists: We love you. We need you. But learn some respect

• Tourism has pushed Marquette to the limit but remains 15% of city’s economy
• Officials have stopped promoting popular destinations, launched etiquette campaign 
• Some residents are still critical, but officials say ‘calming’ efforts are working

MARQUETTE — TikTok videos may inspire visitors to Presque Isle Park to leap off the famous black rocks, but city tourism officials no longer spread the word about the iconic 30-foot cliff jumping.

Same goes for Dead River Falls, even though the waterfall has long been described as one of the best in the Upper Peninsula.

After being overwhelmed by travelers, “they need a break,” Susan Estler, CEO of Travel Marquette, told Bridge Michigan. So both sites were removed from local marketing.

That’s just one of several changes afoot in Marquette after enduring a crush of tourists over recent years. 

Visitors spend some $250 million per year in the city, prompting officials to figure out how best to welcome them while mitigating their impact on the Lake Superior shoreline community.

At city planning sessions this year, suggestions included adding shuttle buses to popular beaches or putting a cap on construction of shoreline hotels.

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Marquette, city advisers said, “must be mindful of not falling into an amenity trap – being ‘loved to death.’”

The city joins other popular natural destinations across the US in trying to balance waves of visitors with the financial benefits of tourism. In Michigan, places like Sleeping Bear Dunes and Pictured Rocks national lakeshores also have struggled under the weight of popularity.

“We have a love-hate relationship with the tourism industry,” Marquette City Manager Karen Kovacs said. 

Marquette wants to lean into the “love” side of that, she added. 

It’s been a struggle.

The city’s narrow beaches on Lake Superior started to be jammed with people during summer 2020, when the pandemic drove people to spend time outdoors. Staking out spaces with tents and towels, some beachgoers could barely stretch out elbows 

During the pandemic, hiking trails were jammed. Cars lined neighborhood streets.  Some visitors brought unleashed dogs. Others left trash or veered off marked trails. Safety concerns escalated after social media videos went viral extolling jumping off the Black Rocks.

The time had come to set some boundaries, Kovacs said.

“We're trying to find a way of naturally getting our tourists to feel like they’re part of the community, which means they’ll respect the community a little more.”

Re-education for ‘rude’ tourists

Complaints led Travel Marquette to launch the Respect Marquette County campaign urging people to spread out and not congregate at the same place, no matter how social media presents the area.

The blog is filled with tips directed at travelers’ behaviors, like respecting how the region comprises Anishinaabe tribal homelands or how e-bikes should interact with traditional cyclists and pedestrians.

“I don't think people intend to wreck anything or do anything wrong,” said Estler of Travel Marquette. “They just don't know. And so I think it's a matter of education and just knowing when they come here that we want them to show respect for the area.”

To combat the potential for over-tourism Travel Marquette has been working with international consultants Destination Think on further approaches to make travel to the area sustainable. 

Estler said she sees some success: “One shining point, I think, is that this year compared to last year for residents seems to be better.”

Still, grumbles remain. Residents say they’re weary of summer traffic congestion or worry the city is trying too hard to appeal to tourists by allowing the development of condos and hotel chains.

Others, including Judy Krause, have other problems with visitors.

“They’re rude,” said Krause, who lives nearby in Ishpeming.

Balancing act

Marquette got a view of what the town would be like without tourism last winter. Snowfall by January was less than half of normal, which over a season could total 150 inches. 

The result was devastating for a number of businesses, said Andy Wallner, co-owner of Tailored CPAs. Instead of trailers hauling snowmobiles into town, he said, the hospitality industry was canceling orders and pausing expenses.

“We were just waiting and waiting and waiting for that next storm,” Wallner said, noting that it didn’t come. 

“Those dollars will never come back to this area.”

The winter slowdown reminded many that tourism is responsible for about 15% of area jobs, along with a good part of the town’s vitality.

Over the course of the year, overall hotel occupancy has been about 50%, Travel Marquette data shows.  But in some of the newer hotels during festival weekends, nightly rates may be $450. 

“And they’re full,” city manager Kovacs said.

The town’s growth, including tourism,  “is providing us, I think, a bigger reach when you think about all the places that people are coming from,” Ore Dock Brewing Co. co-founder and president Andi Pernsteiner told Bridge. “People are coming from all over the nation to Marquette….making us able to show off this place that we love.”

Ore Dock is weeks away from completing an expansion, which will double employment, taking it to 40 people.  The sales spikes during peak summer months lets the business pause in slower months to focus on the community and offer more programming for locals, like singing in a choir and doing yoga, but with beer. 

Attracting more people to town “allows us to do more because we're making more money, we're able to employ more people, we're able to grow,” Pernsteiner said. 

As initiatives like Respect Marquette and city planning to control traffic move forward, many are convinced that the benefits of tourism can continue without the costs to the natural environment and community. 

“We live in a beautiful, temperate area. People are going to find out about it at some point, and they're going to come here,” said Christopher Germain, CEO of the Lake Superior Community Partnership economic development office. 

“And we can either let it happen to us, or we can plan for it.”