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Tourism

Medellin’s Tourism Transformation Looks to Meetings and Conventions

Dennis Schaal photo
Dennis Schaal

Photo Credit: Medellin's metro has spawned "metro culture," which amounts to local pride in a well-run and clean transit system.  Skift

Skift Take

Medellin doesn't have massive casinos or beachfront properties to attract conventioneers but it is a city on the move that is becoming a model and beacon of hope for cities throughout Latin America and developed countries, as well.

When you wander around Medellin and mention to city officials and entrepreneurs that you are touring now-very-dead drug kingpin Pablo Escobar's grave and other points of interest related to the city's dark history, they tend to wince because they are now very much focused on "the transformation." Indeed, Colombia's second-largest city has undergone what appears to be a near-miraculous transition. The murder rate of 6,349 homicides in 1990 plummeted to 658 in 2014. Formerly high-crime neighborhoods such as Comuna 13, which hosts the escalators, welcome tourists as the city, under

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