Amsterdam is planning to slash the number of river boat cruises coming to the city as one of “a hundred” measures the city is taking to reduce over-tourism.

Some 2,300 cruise ships moored on the city waterfront last year but by 2028, the city wants to reduce that to 1150, a measure that would cut tourist numbers by 271,000 and hit the region’s economy to the tune of €73.5 million a year.

The problems caused by the cruises are particularly acute during the spring bulb season when 1,000 river boats anchor in the capital, city finance chief Hester van Buren said. “We have a commitment to keep tourist numbers under 20 million a year.”

“I am not saying this is going to solve the problem of too many tourists,” Van Buren said at Wednesday’s presentation of the plans, when asked if the plan would unfairly impact on elderly tourists who don’t cause trouble.

“But we are not going to divide tourists up into good and bad. This is one of a string of measures to reduce the number of tourists in total. It is about the overcrowding and the coaches parked all over the pavements.”

Research carried out on behalf of the city also shows the measure will lead to almost 200,000 fewer nights being spent in the city’s hotels and cut the number of journeys by coach by 64,400 kilometres.

Hotel owners point out, however, that they will be forced to look for alternative holidaymakers to fill their vacancies instead.

“We don’t take bus tours in general, but we do a lot with river cruises,” said Remco Groenhuijzen, the general manager of the city centre Movenpick hotel. “But we will need to fill the empty rooms. This policy has symbolic value only. It does not solve anything.”

The city has recently launched the second phase of its “stay away” campaign in an effort to cut the number of budget tourists coming to the city to smoke weed and have a good time.

It has hiked tourist taxes to some of the highest levels in the world and research on the impact of ocean-going cruises will also be published before summer with a view to making cuts there too.

“Over tourism is a worldwide problem, and tourists don’t like it when places are so full either,” said Van Buren. “But we can’t simply put a fence around Amsterdam.”