Too Many Tourists May
Endanger Peru's Machu
Picchu
Yearly visits to Machu
Picchu -- Peru's famed
Inca citadel -- have
more than doubled since
1998 to 800,000
tourists, prompting
UNESCO to consider
adding the
jungle-shrouded ruins to
its list of endangered
World Heritage sites.
UNESCO officials will
discuss Machu Picchu's
fate this week at a
World Heritage Committee
meeting in Quebec City
that was called to
determine which of the
world's cultural
treasures should be
added to its list — and
which of those already
included there are now
threatened.
UNESCO committee
spokesman Roni Amelan
declined to confirm that
Machu Picchu, which was
named a World Heritage
Site in 1983, would be
classified as
endangered, but said
"it's a possibility."
Unregulated growth,
including a boom in
hotel and restaurant
construction in the
nearby mountain town of
Aguas Calientes, is
putting pressure on
erosion-prone riverbanks
and could undermine the
site, the report said.
The village lacks
adequate sanitation and
Peru's government has
done little to address
landslide concerns on
the winding, mud
thoroughfare that leads
to the citadel,
according to the report.
Officials also have no
way to detect fires in
the stone citadel or its
heavily wooded environs,
the report said.
Residents in the nearby
city of Cuzco, an
ancient Inca capital,
burned tires and blocked
roads to protest state
plans to extend private
development near the
site earlier this year.
But park officials note
that while there may be
room for improvement in
Aguas Calientes, Machu
Picchu itself is intact.
Archaeologist Piedad
Champi, who oversees
conservation efforts,
noted that UNESCO
praised the monuments'
preservation just last
year.
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