In a plot twist that could only make sense on an island where goats outnumber luxury beds, Kea’s municipal council has unanimously thrown the brakes on a bold luxury hotel project. Spanish developer InmoParck Invest, who must have believed paradise could be piped from underground, watched as the wheels came off their 303-bed resort planned for Vroskopos, the sun-soaked western edge of Tzia (for the mainland crowd, that’s Kea’s snappier nickname).
Kea’s civic minders, probably sipping their morning coffee with a side of irony, raised two irresistible objections. First, the resort’s thirst: 64,000 cubic meters of water every year drawn from three wells, and not the bottomless kind. “The risk for local depletion is too great, especially in Poisses—an area already hit hard by dry spells that shrivel crops and patience alike,” one official warned, adding, “We cannot sacrifice the island’s future so guests can enjoy longer showers.”
Next was the absence of any plan—or even a vague sketch—for housing the army of staff this sort of luxury complex demands. As one member flatly put it, “You can’t run a five-star hotel if the staff sleep in tents behind the dumpsters.”
Unanimous Rejections and Hollow Wells: A Council Finds Its Backbone
So far, construction activity has been proceeding both logically and legally. Preliminary work, including a few eager boreholes and a sprinkle of excavation, has already gotten underway because nothing says “reversible” quite like starting before the ink’s dry. Residents see the subtle finger to the public process, warning that developers are “trying to create facts on the ground, hoping we’ll be too distracted by the dust to notice the groundwater running out.”
The municipal council’s firm “no” has left the future of this five-star ambition in the very same limbo reserved for unfinished hotel pools and developer promises. As officials clocked out, one declared, “This is about survival, not profits. Tourists can swim, but if there’s no water, what then?”
Not to be mistaken for a sudden wave of anti-tourist zeal, Kea’s chilly reception is less about spurning outsiders and more about basic math. Greece barely caught its economic breath after losing a quarter of its GDP the last time the music stopped. Since then, tourism has kept the tables turned and the lights on, but not without a few high-profile cracks. Overtourism, overbuilding, and the kind of cultural erasure that turns an island into a postcard backdrop keep bubbling up.
Meanwhile, the One&Only luxury resort, which opened in the same patch of Kea just last year, sparked enough controversy to melt an ice cream cone in midsummer, with locals squabbling over the environmental and social bill.
Attractions That Might Survive the Luxury Stampede
- Quiet stone-paved villages, where the loudest sound might be a distant bleating goat
- Ancient oak forests, popular with hikers and rare plants that refuse to be Instagrammed
- Sun-bleached beaches with actual sand, not crushed concrete from abandoned hotel sites
- The Karthaia ruins are best visited early—before someone decides to build a helipad next door
- Freshwater springs (quantities may vary, depending on resort development trends)
Tzia’s charm lies in its stubborn refusal to yield. Maybe that’s why this luxury hotel project, built on a promise of abundance, has ended up parched.
Will this be the last time a five-star project collides with an island’s limits? Unlikely, but as long as there’s more water in tourists’ bottles than in the ground, the council seems ready to keep voting “no.”
