New York (AFP)
Voters in Jersey City, a New York suburb, have inflicted a humiliating defeat on Airbnb, reflecting the efforts of a growing number of cities to limit the activities of the housing-sharing platform.
Some 70% of voters in the 270,000-strong town, separated from Manhattan by the Hudson River, on Tuesday approved stiff restrictions on short-term rentals, according to a near-final result released Wednesday.
These rules, which include obtaining a permit and the presence of the owner on the site, should reduce the influx of visitors via the giant of the online rental, accused of aggravating the housing crisis, transforming quiet neighborhoods and harming the hotel sector.
Democratic mayor Steven Fulop praised the result, which validates a city council ordinance passed in June that Airbnb had bitterly disputed.
The platform had gathered 20,000 signatures calling for a popular vote on the settlement, and spent several million dollars in the hope of canceling it.
"You led a misinformation campaign in Jersey City, you lied and spent $ 5 million - and Jersey City showed you what it was thinking," tweeted the Mayor to Airbnb's attention after the vote.
The Californian platform, which plans an IPO on an unspecified date in 2020, has defeated the New York hotel lobby.
"Since the beginning of this campaign, we knew it was going to be one of the toughest battles for us, with the big New York hotel industry set to fight sharing housing," said Christopher Nulty. spokesperson for the start-up in a statement.
This defeat confirms the efforts of many cities - starting with major tourist metropolises such as New York, Paris, Berlin or Barcelona - to curb Airbnb's activity.
Launched in 2008, the platform, which is not obliged to publish its results, was valued in 2017 at over $ 30 billion.
At the end of September, it reported a turnover of more than $ 1 billion in the second quarter of 2019, for the second time since its creation.
© 2019 AFP