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A battle is brewing on a tiny luxury island 30 miles off the coast of Massachusetts, according to many reports.
Gorgeous scenes of Nantucket have been nearly impossible to miss lately on TikTok and Instagram, with images of weathered-gray cottages, colorful hydrangeas and pristine beaches populating social media platforms.
Yet the island has seen tourism explode, according to some residents and longtime visitors — and locals say they’ve become inundated by visitors, crowds and noise.
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“[Nantucket] has become something it wasn’t before,” a 23-year-old lifetime Nantucket resident, who asked for anonymity, told Fox News Digital. “It was kind of like a rustic New England vacation spot, and it’s been changing for the last 20 years.”
The person added, “It’s transforming into something that [residents] don’t recognize, and it makes them very upset.”
With no bridge to the island, visitors cannot drive or take a train. Nantucket is accessible exclusively by air and sea, requiring travelers to arrive by ferry or plane, per the Town of Nantucket.
For decades, that lack of accessibility kept crowds in check.
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“You either have to fly or take the ferry,” J.Q. Louise, a Boston-based travel influencer who has visited Nantucket several times, told Fox News Digital.
“I think that’s what’s kept it exclusive for so many years,” she said.
That appears to be changing, as the island typically draws an estimated 2 million visitors annually, according to the Nantucket Current.
Recent complaints about influencers reached a fever pitch when a longtime shop owner hung a sign saying, “No Influencers.”
Store owner John Sylvia posted the sign at Four Winds Craft Guild, his Nantucket antiques and artisan shop.
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“I feel sometimes my store is used as someone’s background, a stage,” Sylvia told The New York Times.
“I don’t have this hatred toward influencers,” he clarified. “It was more of a joke. It is a problem we should look at as a society.”
Sylvia’s partner, Jessica Jenkins, told the outlet she feels deluged by “people creating videos on corners of themselves sipping an iced coffee and looking over their shoulder and doing a shoe kick or whatever.”
Fox News Digital reached out to Four Winds Craft Guild for further comment.
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Content creators such as Paige Lorenze are defending themselves.
“If you call yourself a feminist but proudly put up a ‘No Influencers’ sign, it’s worth asking who you are attempting to delegitimize, and why,” Lorenze, who owns a boutique near Four Winds Craft Guild, commented on a now-deleted Instagram post.
“I have no issue with [John Sylvia’s] shop, and I hope people keep walking in and supporting island craftspeople,” Lorenze told The Cut.
“I just think Nantucket’s story is more generous than that sign.”
Fox News Digital reached out to Paige Lorenze for further comment.
In the spring, the Siasconset Civic Association, a nonprofit community advocacy organization, proposed recommendations to curb overcrowding. The Nantucket Select Board designated specific visiting hours on the footpath for July and August.
“Bluff docents” — called rangers in an earlier version of the proposal — were approved to keep an eye on activity, according to Nantucket Current.
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The Sconset Civic Association also proposed turnstiles or gates at entrances, but those weren’t approved.
A Reddit post on the Nantucket debate generated hundreds of comments.
“My family has a house there, and trust me when I say the entire island has no need for influencers or to go viral,” a Reddit user said.
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The “island gets so crowded during the summer that even cottage industries have popped up to handle the crowds,” the commenter added.
A Connecticut resident who has spent summers in Sconset for 38 years also said the island feels different.
“The crowds are flashy, but they have more to spend,” the person, who asked to remain anonymous, told Fox News Digital.
J.Q. Louise believes the tiny size of the island — it’s about 14 miles long and 3.5 miles wide — magnifies the problem.
“It kind of felt like a hidden gem, and it definitely isn’t hidden anymore,” she said.
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Fox News Digital reached out to the town of Nantucket, Siasconset Civic Association and Nantucket Island Chamber of Commerce for comment.
Ashley J. DiMella and Jessica Mekles of Fox News Digital contributed reporting.
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