The Eiffel Tower, Notre-Dame Cathedral, and the Louvre Museum are among the most iconic places that tourists visit when they come in France’s capital.

But there is a ‘so French’ and romantic area that tourists enjoy exploring more and more in Paris: Montmartre.

Atop the famed hill where the Sacré-Cœur Basilica crowns Paris’ skyline, thousands of tourists from all around the globe wander every day in the crowded streets of this artistic district.

But the charming postcard is now under pressure from overtourism.

When jeweler Olivier Baroin moved into an apartment in Montmartre, it felt like he was living in a village in the heart of Paris. Not any more.

Most of the local stores are gone, along with many of the parking spots and the friendly atmosphere, he says.

In their place are hoards of people shooting selfies, shops selling tourist trinkets and cafés with menus catering to the visitors and seating spilling out onto narrow cobbled streets and squares.

Baroin has had enough.

“When the Paris City Hall implemented the pedestrianization system, I put up my apartment for sale. I told myself that I had no other choice but to leave since, as I have a disability, it’s even more complicated when you can no longer take your car, when you have to call a taxi from morning to night, when you have to take a taxi home every night," he told The Associated Press.

"First of all, it increases the budget tenfold for the people who live here, and then it becomes very inconvenient. It has become very unpleasant.”

Montmartre is just one flashpoint in a growing European revolt against mass tourism. From Venice to Barcelona to Amsterdam, cities are struggling to absorb surging visitor numbers.

In Paris — one of the globe’s most popular tourist magnets and the host of last year's Olympic Games — residents in Montmartre are now pushing back. A black banner strung between two balconies reads, in English: “Behind the postcard: locals mistreated by the Mayor.” Another, in French, says: “Montmartre residents resisting.”

Residents lament what they call the “Disneyfication” of the once-bohemian slice of Paris.

The basilica says it attracts up to 11 million people a year now — that's even more than the Eiffel Tower — while daily life in the neighborhood has been overtaken by tuk-tuks, tour groups, photo queues and short-term rentals.

“Now, there are no more shops at all, there are no more food shops, so everything must be delivered,” said 56-year-old Baroin, who is a member of a local residents' protest group called Vivre a Montmartre, or Living in Montmartre.

The unrest in Montmartre echoes tensions a three-kilometer (two-mile) walk across town at the Louvre, where in June staff staged a brief wildcat strike over chronic overcrowding, understaffing and deteriorating conditions. The Louvre logged 8.7 million visitors in 2024 — more than double what its infrastructure was designed to handle.

Paris, a city of just over 2 million residents if you count its sprawling suburbs, welcomed 48.7 million tourists in 2024, according to official data — a 2% increase on the previous year. Paris tourism officials say bookings were up by one-fifth at the beginning of 2025, signaling another potentially record-breaking season.

Sacré-Cœur, the most visited monument in France in 2024, and the surrounding Montmartre neighborhood have turned into what some locals call an open-air theme park.

Paris authorities did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Montmartre’s tensions mirror those erupting across the continent. In Barcelona, thousands have taken to the streets this year, some wielding water pistols, demanding limits on cruise ships and short-term tourist rentals. Venice now charges an entry fee for day-trippers and caps visitor numbers. And in Athens, authorities have imposed a daily limit on visitors to the Acropolis, to protect the ancient monument from record-breaking tourist crowds.

Urban planners warn that historic neighborhoods risk becoming what some critics liken to “zombie cities” — picturesque but lifeless, their residents displaced by short-term visitors.

Paris is trying to mitigate the problems: Municipal authorities slashed the short-term rental limit by 25% to 90 days, tightened housing rules, and pledged to crack down on unlicensed properties.

Even so, overtourism in the French capital and elsewhere is a problem unlikely to go away any time soon.

AP video by Oleg Cetinic; production by Catherine Gaschka