The other tensions in this series were mostly problems outside the traveller. Roma is different. In this district’s tension the traveller — especially the remote worker — may be not an observer but a party.
A new phase
Roma’s revival (Ep.8) soon summoned a new gentrification. Since 2020 in particular, a phase driven by digital nomads and short-term rental platforms like Airbnb has intensified Fact. Airbnb listings across Roma Norte and Sur, Condesa and Hipódromo rose from 2,898 in 2019 to 5,033 in 2023, a 74% increase, and Mexico City has over 26,500 Airbnb listings in all Fact.
A widening gap
The numbers point one way. Housing costs in Mexico have risen 286% since 2005 while real wages have fallen 33% Fact. Average monthly rent in Roma Sur reached about 42,800 pesos in 2025 Fact. This gap — housing up, income down — presses on the people who lived in this district Estimate.
July 2025
And that pressure came into the street. On 4 July 2025 anti-gentrification protests were held in areas including Roma Fact. They demanded the right to housing and protested displacement by tourism and migration Fact. Some graffiti carried harsh anti-foreigner messages Fact, and the episode sets a charge of xenophobia against a counter-claim of legitimate defence of the right to housing Fact. This series does not adjudicate between the two — but the facts are these: what rose was rent, what is pushed out is people, and the anger is real Estimate.
The government’s response
The government moved too. Reforms were introduced: rent-increase caps tied to inflation, public registration of rental contracts, and limits on how many Airbnbs an individual can own and how many days a year they can be let Fact. As policy intervened over road-widening in Dadaocheng and pier redevelopment in Incheon, in Roma renting and short-term stays became the stage of policy Estimate.
The seventh city of one question
Every city this series has walked passed through one question — who decides the next layer of a working old district Estimate? Roma is the seventh. And here the question puts on a nationality. Where the tensions of Dadaocheng, Incheon and Shinsekai were mainly between domestic capital and residents, in Roma the problem between remote-work income that crossed a border and the original residents stands in front Estimate. So the traveller cannot be neutral in this tension.
Where the traveller stands
So this chapter’s conclusion is concrete. First, choosing a hotel or guesthouse over a whole-unit short-term rental (Airbnb) adds less to the pressure that turns housing stock into tourist stock Estimate. Second, spending at the market and stalls of Ep.6 and the district’s old shops bypasses chains and tourist capital and leaves more in the district Estimate. Third, not simply imitating content that consumes this district as a "nomad mecca." Roma is not a backdrop but someone’s home Estimate. To walk the district the earthquake saved so that, this time, the visit does not push it out — that is all this chapter asks.