We want to visit that!” This town in Creuse arouses curiosity on the internet

Crozant is ranked among the thirty most consulted small towns on Wikipedia, according to a survey conducted by the Lab Nouvelles Marge. This notoriety continues to grow, marked by ever more numerous tourists. Local stakeholders are trying to control this phenomenon and find the balance between attractiveness of the territory and preservation of the environment.

Small towns also arouse the curiosity of Internet users. For this study, the Wikipedia pages of 1,600 small towns in France were analyzed by the Lab Nouvelles Marge, an agency which aims to revitalize rural areas. “All small towns have a Wikipedia page that is sometimes more extensive than that of the municipality, notes Jean-Pierre Papin, associated with the design office. The smaller a territory, the more searched it is on the site. We need more information.”

Several criteria explain the success of certain cities, such as digital visibility: “For example, Étretat (Seine-Maritime), first in the ranking, is a nationally known city, even of global interest, very “instagrammable”, with beautiful landscapes, he emphasizes.

Other cities perhaps have a less marked identity, because they have a strong residential and less strong tourist function. In addition, they are absorbed by a larger city. There are also new towns which were born with the regrouping of municipalities and which have lost their identity.

Jean-Pierre Papin

associated with the design office at Lab Nouvelles Marges

For local actors who wish to revitalize their territory, initiating a reflection on the history of their city is a first step: “What does my city say? All cities have a history, a specialty, local production, a small factory. Everything is linked to heritage. What we recommend as a basis is to highlight the images of your city, hire a photographer to do it so that merchants can be present online to highlight local productions. You have to do some animation on social networks to be visible digitally. suggests Jean-Pierre Papin.

Crozant, for his part, understood the formula. The city has been able to highlight the potential of its territory. Indeed, it is through the history of the Valley of the Painters that the department, as well as the tourist office, decided to promote the town and its surroundings. “This area extends over 25 kilometers. It is a major work of communication and memory which has been carried out by local elected officials for around ten years, starting with the Crozant fortress which has become the star of the networks social”, summarizes Pierre Veysseix, director of cultural and tourist sites for the Dunois community of communes.

This work is bearing fruit. The town is undergoing major redevelopment work to accommodate the growing number of tourists. Investments have been made in museums. A tourist train, hot air ballooning and nautical activities have been developed. Restaurants could open and remain open permanently.

Also read: “I was blown away by Claude Monet”, an enthusiast tells the story of the painter’s Creuse paintings

Although on a national scale, tourist numbers have declined, Crozant has held up and has even seen its tourist numbers increase for four years. “People walk a lot to the images. People come to the tourist office with a photo they found on social networks and tell me, 'We want to visit that,' notes Pierre Veysseix. Before, we had people on July 14 and 15, during the Easter and All Saints holidays. But now, from March 15, we have the first tourists. Our index is precisely the fortress: four years ago, there were 9,000 visitors, now we are at 20,000 per year.”

However, local actors are attentive to the effects of tourism and try to control the phenomenon.

We are vigilant about waste management. We notice the problems linked to overtourism. For example, on the fortress, we see that the passageways, which are already deteriorating with climate change, are even more so when you have nearly 700 tourists passing through over two weeks.

Pierre Veysseix

Director of cultural and tourist sites of the Dunois community of communes

In this sense, the department, in collaboration with tourism stakeholders, is working on a sustainable tourism plan which aims to “to protect and avoid abuses and remain in line with the territory. We are trying to set up observatories which will allow us to have quantified data on all of this”explains Pierre Veysseix.

The director hopes that this tourism, for the moment, virtuous for the territory, can have a positive effect on the surrounding communities and encourage travelers to visit them.