Recent tourism gentrification has been attributed to an increase in extreme short-term rentals through P2P digital platforms. Although many tourist cities have implemented regulations on short-term rentals, several studies have shown the ineffectiveness of those regulations. This study aimed to investigate the effect of the Kyoto City government’s regulation on preventing population decline in the historical center of Kyoto City. The Kyoto City government indirectly regulates simple accommodations (SAs) through the host’s location of SA management stations. Specifically, small SAs must have hosts who are stationed approximately 800 m from the management SAs. The research design adopted the difference-in-differences regression analysis that analyzed the effects of the number of accommodations on population change. As a result, this study found the number of opening SAs decreased by about half after the regulation. The result suggests that the regulation on SAs might have made it more difficult for SAs to open. Instead of SAs, the number of opening hotels increased by about 1.5 times after regulation. In addition, the regulation increased the number of populations by 7.419 [1.268, 13.57] for each additional hotel from the pre-regulation to post-regulation periods. In the historical center of Kyoto City, population decline accelerated from the pre-regulation period (n = −365) to the post-regulation period (n = −1073). Therefore, our findings were interesting as the populations increased in the NAs where hotels opened during the post-regulation period. Thus, the Kyoto City government’s regulation was effective in preventing population decline due to tourism gentrification.

The tourism intensity index can be used to determine the risk of overtourism. This study aimed to clarify the spatial patterns and geographic characteristics of tourism-accommodation hotspots in Kyoto City. This study calculated the tourism-accommodation intensity index as the ratio of the number of accommodation rooms to that of households. The results revealed that tourism-accommodation intensity hotspots emerged in neighborhoods near the periphery of the southeastern historical center. The hotspots emerged in neighborhoods where the number of rooms has exceeded that of households. Additionally, this study revealed that tourism-accommodation intensity hotspots were spatially associated with proximity to main stations and world heritage sites. This study's findings are useful for developing effective urban zones with total volume control in these neighborhood-units. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced many accommodations to close. However, the pandemic might play an important role in providing an opportunity to achieve sustainable tourism with a good balance between housing for residents and accommodation for tourists. As the theoretical framework, this study aims to investigate the change in households triggered by accommodation closure due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Kyoto City’s historical center. Furthermore, the causes of these changes were examined by analyzing the real estate properties traded on the market. For the analysis, this study considered the COVID-19 pandemic as a natural experiment to investigate the causal relationship between the number of households, closed accommodations, and real estate properties. As a result, it was found that households increased by approximately 1.34 in neighborhood associations with closed simple accommodations. Regarding the causes of the increase, closed simple accommodation properties tend to change to short-term rentals. This study also highlighted that closed simple accommodations have significantly smaller room sizes than other property types, with only slightly higher prices. As a theoretical contribution, our findings suggest that the pandemic might have suppressed tourism gentrification, but increased the number of households.

Before the Coronavirus Disease pandemic of 2019, many tourist cities suffered from over-tourism, and tourism gentrification seriously impacted the living environment for residents. This study aimed to clarify the statistical relationship between the increase in the number of accommodations―hotels and simple accommodations―and housing prices in Kyoto City, one of the world’s most famous tourist cities. As a key result, this study clarified that the price change in houses for sale was significantly related to the number of hotels in the historical center of Kyoto City. Specifically, it was found that the average price of houses for sale increased by JPY 2,013,957/USD 18,382 per hotel in a neighborhood district. In addition, the average price of houses for sale increased by JPY 6,412,102/USD 58,526 from 2015 to 2019. Compared to previous studies, in the historical center of Kyoto City, the novelty of our finding is that the cause for increasing housing prices was not simple accommodations but hotels, and the effect of housing prices was not on houses for rent but those for sale. These results are significant because they indicate that tourism gentrification causes housing affordability risk for the local communities, including young households.

In recent years, tourist cities worldwide have experienced rapid tourism gentrification, which was caused by the spread of P2P accommodation-matching digital platforms. The research problem is set as follows: whether tourism gentrification caused a population decline in the historical center area of tourist cities. Therefore, this study aims to clarify the causal statistical relationship between population decline and tourism gentrification, focusing on urban transformation by accommodation. As a case, this study analyzes Kyoto City, a world-class tourist city. In summary, we conclude that tourism gentrification caused population decline through displacement in the historical center of Kyoto City. On the other hand, it was found that population decline occurred from factors other than tourism gentrification in the outside area of Kyoto City. The academic contribution is to clarify the effect of population decline on the cause of urban transformation through time precedence with statistical correlation. For tourist cities where the population is declining, the distinction between cause and effect is critical for policymaking toward sustainable tourism where the population is declining. The practical implication is the need for urban planning against tourism gentrification toward sustainability tourism in the historical center of Kyoto City.

Tourism gentrification has become a social issue in tourist cities worldwide. This paper’s research question is as follows: has tourism gentrification caused a population decline in tourist cities? This study aims to clarify the statistical relationship between the population decline and the location of accommodation on the neighborhood association scale. It analyzes Kyoto City, which is one of the most famous tourist cities worldwide. The statistical relationship between two types of accommodation—hotels and simple accommodation—is analyzed, using geographic natural experiments. The study concludes that the neighborhood association with simple accommodation decreased the population more significantly than that without simple accommodation in the historical center of Kyoto City. This result indicates that the tourism gentrification had caused a population decline in the historical center of Kyoto City. Moreover, it was found that tourism gentrification has affected the outside center of Kyoto City. The population decline might be due to simple accommodation being converted from houses due to tourism gentrification. This study’s results suggest the need for urban policy to regulate zoning for the locations of simple accommodation.

This study aims to clarify the process by which the local community in the Shutoku District of Kyoto City worked to develop community-based guidelines in response to tourism gentrification caused by simple accommodations. The method was an action research method. Specifically, the author emigrated to Shutoku District and analyzed the dialog process based on the minutes of regular meetings, workshops, and questionnaire surveys. Consequently, it was determined that the whole process could be divided into four phases: (1) the research period, (2) measures against simple accommodations, (3) coexistence with simple accommodations, and (4) guidelines development. The results suggest that the committee has taken advantage of the group dialog and progressed with a shift in policy developments.

The results of this paper clarify that the residents evaluated the tourism-gentrification caused by guesthouses negatively in a case study of Shutoku District in the central area of Kyoto City. The tourism-gentrification caused by guesthouses is defined as a phenomenon in which traditional communities are destroyed as part of the process of tourism-related gentrification. Three points are confirmed by this research. First, gentrification occurred from 2015 to 2019. Second, the residents evaluated it negatively. Third, there is a possibility that residents and guesthouses can form a symbiotic relationship if methods such as the employment of 'resident managers' are utilised.