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Difficult to say, good doctor, but I hope you don't have to pay even more than you already do. It was a shocker coming back from India and having to think in pounds again, I definitely can't afford to live in the UK any more, it's so expensive.

As for top 100 lists and all that? If I see them I can't help ticking off the places I've visited (which takes us back to mattyboy's post) but I usually end up feeling depressed that there are so many places I'm never going to be able to see -- and if I do get around to seeing them they'll probably be full of people busily ticking off their next place ;-)

The South Downs was worse than London Liz!
I'd rather not get tangled up in mattyboy's notional 'ticking off' discussion. I was pondering on whether people actually respond to lists like that. To tick or not to tick is irrelevant.
'Ahah, Greenwich has just made it onto Frommer's must see list. I had wondered about going there but now I must' or 'now I mustn't because it'll be expensive and (even more) crowded'......

Hmmmm, I didn't express myself properly...

My own response (relevant or not) to your question vis-à-vis Frommer's 'must see' list is that I reckon to most people it will be used as a tick list. I don't have a tick list, but when I come across these lists I find I always check the entries against my experience and then wonder about going to the places I haven't visited. I always reckon that's what everyone else will do, so the places will get too busy or too spoilt!

This is only my personal response and that is all I can give.

I don't know what the facts are, maybe the tourist offices for the 'must see' places will have some documentary evidence? Maybe the Towers knows more...

An offshoot to this is to ask the question, how do the Frommer's of this world come up with these lists in the first place?

I usually see those lists and get annoyed at what I see is a waste of space in the magazine I've just spent my hard-earned cash on. They rarely seem to be based on any kind of informed or data-based premise and often seem like the author just was making it up as they go along. How many people have been sucked into the see Cuba before Castro dies advertising by stealth? Be very interested to see if, like Dr G ponders, the numbers actually do or don't rise as a result.

Oh let's hope it doesn't get over-run. I'm sure no-one reads that Frommers anyway ;)
London will always attract lots of visitors because it's an incredible city, and perhaps for a while the tourist numbers will go up a bit in Greenwich. But I imagine the tourist numbers are fairly stable and established; it's not as if it's one of the those newly-discovered places that people have to see before it's ruined by over-development.
Let's not tell anyone about the laser though, because that definitely makes the place worth a visit and you don't want hoards of people crowding outside your house at night trying to get a good look ;)

I remember when the Berlin Wall came down, every other page in the newspapers had adverts enticing people to visit Berlin, you could go to both East & West Berlin before the wall came down but suddenly it was the in place to go and yes the prices went up and everywhere was booked up.

It seems to me like a simple case of market forces. Travel is influenced by advertising just as much as, say, buying a new car. If this advertising is staggeringly succesful and hordes of the burger munchers pitch up in Greenwich with their big hats and bigger waistlines, then I'm sure that the prices will be subject to creep - pure supply and demand.

I pay attention to such things - I will admit to moving Cuba up my list as yes, I do want to see it before Castro dies and Colonel Sanders takes over. Yes, I would be more inclined to see somewhere that is subject to a change in its cultural standing or going through/been though some socio-economic changes. Take the Gorilla - how many people are flooding to Rwanda/Uganda to see gorillas, as it maybe the last chance to see wild specimens. Tigers, too. Burma is on the menu for a lot MyWs these days - why? Because now they can.

Yes, on reflection, I think box-ticking is more prevalent that perhaps most people would admit. I'm preperaed to shot at for saying this, but I think that the 'been there done that' makes up a substantial part of most peoples travel philosophy.

Yeah I haven't been to Cuba, but would like to before it completely changes. Much like you say about Burma...it's going to change quickly, and I'd like to see it before everyone is wearing high street clobber, and there is a mcdonalds on every street corner. I'm not so sure it's all about box ticking, there is an element of that sure...but I think lots of people are curious about and want to experience what many consider to be the greatest films, most regarded books, and also great travel destinations.

I do still read read a piece on some city, country which I've hardly know anything about, and have never considered and think...christ that sounds brilliant, I have to go there soon.

Places do change so quickly, if you've ever been back to a place you went to 20 years ago, and loved it, it can be really disheartening to go back and see lovely peaceful places turned into busy, tourist traps.

Thanks for the views! In response to Liz and Julia amongst the others, a Frommer's spokesperson suggested that the 'top picks offer emerging destinations and smart, lesser-known alternatives to overrun spots'. Mmmmm.

Ah G-man, gonna pick up on the Pluck salutation - now don't go all huffy on me! Sure I had to sneak in here (haha) under cover and do a piece on naval gazing now that peace, were merely silence, has descended on the rest of the site. Because now navel gazing has been confused (by matty to pseudoymn) with looking at yer auld ships! So is Greenwich the 'in' place to naval gaze? I thought ye were in the business of packaging up time over there and doling it out in straight lines. Wild to be so stupid. And for so long!
On a more serious note (I'm a slow learner - no cracks or barbs on these serious travel threads...) it sure looks like lists, cultural cities etc do rank up the visitor numbers and it's hard then to blame the local economy sucking up the juices of that elevation! But will Greenwich not be there again in two years time? Go then, if you haven't been before the madding hordes. Yes, it is always so nice to look back 20 yrs perhaps and see that you may have had a more blissful sojourn before a place became A-listed. I think of Phi-Phi without a hotel at all, of the Inca Trail before the tourist trains and a hotel near the site or the Tiz n'Tit when it was a gravel track (maybe still is?). What of nearer to home? Some of you will have seen the pictures of my neck of the woods round Fintown on here. Well come quick, those roads less travelled and skylines that I allude to are being sacrificed on the high altar of renewable wind energy. Hundreds of turbines up. Thousands planned.

Jon, I wish we had an A-listing designation fortcoming from Frommers to bring the multidudes in for a year. Then it would likely wane to sustainable numbers. But it might keep the turbines out!

Sometimes it's a great thing for a cities redevelopment to make a big song and dance to generate more tourism...Liverpool for example is a fantastic looking city after it became the cultural capital and the money flooded in.

I do get the feeling sometimes, with these lists of new upcoming cities to see this next year....that sometimes they just put any old names on the list, filler so to speak. Greenwich is nice however, I quite like it.

Of course I agree that the response in that local community is to take advantage of the 'free' advertising and market forces will come into play. It will be a fantastic boost to local economies in many instances. My query was maybe directed more at the response by visitors.... would that put them off, the threat of the cost or the squash of the crowds?
FT - I have no choice re Greenwich since I live in the thick of it... the straight line of time passes through my house and I'm often turfing tourists off my doorstep where they're posing for pics! But to your turbine troubles.... seems I must get there quick or you and yours must battle harder to get Fintown listed! Cheers, DrG