North America & The Caribbean's top sustainable travel destinations in 2024

Kansas City

MISSOURI USA

There aren’t many destinations in the US Midwest where visitors could hope to get around without renting a car, but Kansas City is one. The free KC Streetcar connects popular neighbourhoods, downtown venues and some 6,000 hotel rooms along the 3.2km-long Streetcar route – and two extensions are now
under construction.

One of the biggest venues on the extended line is also shattering glass ceilings. The world’s first stadium purpose-built for a women’s professional sports team, the CPKC Stadium features 180 solar panels and is pursuing LEED Gold certification. Thanks to a partnership with Bold Reuse, a women-owned company, no single-use plastic bottles or cups will be served in the stadium – only reusable or recyclable ones.

The new terminal at Kansas City International Airport, opened in 2023, was also designed with sustainability and accessibility in mind. It’s the first such project in the Midwest to achieve LEED Gold certification (only the second in the USA), as well as boasting gender-neutral bathrooms, local eating and shopping outlets, a visual paging system to alert deaf travellers to flight changes, and a simulator in which travellers can walk through the entire airport experience, helping minimise pre-departure anxiety.

Calgary

ALBERTA CANADA

Declared the Canadian city with the largest ecological footprint in 2005, Calgary has since taken many steps to improve. Its per capita carbon emissions have decreased by 27% as the city’s population soared 58% – a welcome decoupling of population growth from carbon emissions.

The city’s CTrain is the only light rail system in North America powered by 100% wind-generated electricity. Calgary is also home to the most extensive urban pathway system in North America, stretching some 1,000km.

The iconic Calgary Stampede venue has also stepped up its sustainability efforts. Bat houses have been installed to create an eco-friendly mosquito-control system, and the Stampede also donates more than 100,000 meals to local people in need each year. Many tonnes of used cooking oil are recycled to create biofuel, too, and horse droppings are sent to a tree farm for use as fertiliser.

Colorado

USA

With its sunny but breezy climate, it’s no wonder Colorado generates over one-third of its electricity from renewable sources. With that push for sustainable energy, and the rise of organic and sustainable dining in cities such as Boulder – a US pioneer of farm-to-table eating – there’s plenty here to lure conscious travellers. There are diverse ways you can help nature while exploring it, too. Hikes with the Walking Mountains Science Center, and multi-day trekking and packrafting trips with Rewilding Expeditions, blend outdoor escapes with environmental education or conservation. For more straight-up voluntourism, join a session with the Rocky Mountain Field Institute or the Wildlands Restoration Volunteers to help clear trails, pick up rubbish or build steps and walls to restore the landscape and help others enjoy it.

Arizona

USA

In response to the widespread surge of interest in outdoor activities in 2020, the Arizona Office of Tourism rapidly launched AppreciateAZ. This programme, designed in collaboration with Leave No Trace, promotes responsible outdoor travel – and with more than 90% of such recreation occurring in easily accessible areas visited by day users, the need was clear. AppreciateAZ helps visitors understand the importance of key principles such as sticking to designated trails, following the ‘pack it in, pack it out’ rule for rubbish (including organic waste), keeping a respectful distance from wildlife, and not collecting ‘souvenirs’ – not even pebbles or flowers. In addition to resources for travellers, the programme provides training for local businesses and spreads the word through billboards, children’s videos, digital and social media that were seen tens of millions of times within the first two years of the campaign. These concepts are the bedrocks of sustainable nature-based tourism, so we love to see them being promoted so ambitiously, helping preserve iconic natural spaces that are welcoming ever more visitors.

Franklin

TENNESSEE USA

Tennessee’s first LEED Silver-certified city remains one of only 10 such destinations worldwide. Franklin also boasts multiple LEED-certified hotels and historic restoration initiatives.

One particularly innovative project was the construction of Franklin’s newest music venue, the 7,500-capacity FirstBank Amphitheater, built into a former quarry. Roads to the amphitheatre were built using 900 tonnes of junk – years’ worth of material illegally dumped in the abandoned quarry – and construction involved cleaning up polluted ponds and trails. The amphitheatre itself is a plastic-free and zero-landfill facility: all drinks are served in infinitely recyclable aluminium, and food is served in compostable packaging with plant-based utensils that are composted on-site.

San Luis Obispo Country

CALIFORNIA USA

Reducing food miles is second nature in this sun-kissed stretch of California’s Central Coast, blessed by long strands of sandy shoreline and lush fields. A year-round growing season and vast swathes of agricultural land and vineyards bolster a strong farm-to-table dining ethos epitomised by restaurants such as Paso Robles’ Thomas Hill Organics. Weekly farmers’ markets offer opportunities to sample the produce of small, family-run farms and artisans. Most exciting are those businesses built on regenerative initiatives – for example, Kelpful, which runs foraging adventures along the coast, turning the collected seaweed into gifts and condiments. Another gem is Re:Find Distillery, also in Paso Robles, offering tastings of sustainable spirits made from grape juice discarded during the winemaking process.

Cayman Islands

Boasting 365 dive sites equipped with moorings – so that boat don’t need to drop anchor, risking damaging coral reefs – and home to more endemic plant species than the Galápagos Islands, the Cayman Islands is all about nature and conservation.

The Blue Iguana Conservation project in Grand Cayman, largest of the three islands, has worked for more than 30 years to protect the territory’s largest land animal. Formerly listed as critically endangered, with fewer than 30 individuals estimated to survive in the wild in 2001, the species is now recovering: in 2018, the 1,000th blue iguana was released into the wild; more than 1,400 of these creatures are now living free in Grand Cayman thanks to the project’s efforts. Visitors can take an in-depth tour of the facility or even volunteer (for a minimum of two weeks).

Last year, Little Cayman’s Marine Parks and Protected Areas were placed on the UNESCO World Heritage tentative list, recognising efforts to protect spawning sites of the endangered Nassau grouper.

San Juan Islands

USA

A peaceful bolthole for Seattle residents for much of the year, this archipelago receives very different visitors between May and October – orca, humpbacks and minke whales. Perhaps the most prized sightings are of the three endangered Southern Resident orca pods, designated J, K and L. These charismatic cetaceans dine almost exclusively on salmon, and are foraging ever further afield in response to dwindling local stocks. So in 2015 whalewatching operators San Juan Safaris and San Juan Island Outfitters launched a Conservation Fund, donating a proportion of each tour fee to organisations researching whale and salmon conservation – over £150,000 so far. Joyfully, you can help conserve these spectacular predators simply by seeing them in the wild.

Bermuda

Sometimes serious environment problems have unexpectedly simple solutions. In Bermuda, one such creative response is food – specifically, lionfish chowder.

Native to the tropical waters of the Indo-Pacific region, over the past four decades the strikingly striped lionfish has become an invasive species in the Atlantic, including the waters around Bermuda. Though relatively slow-moving, lionfish are aggressive hunters with no natural predators in the region – and, as a result, they have major impacts on native fish species and, as a knock-on effect, coral reefs. Bermuda is one of many destinations teaching locals to hunt these invasive fish with spears, avoiding the predators’ flared dorsal fins equipped with venomous spines.

In March, the second Eat’Um to Beat’Um Lionfish Chowder Competition at the Bermuda Aquarium, Museum and Zoo attracted entries from eight local restaurants and chefs. But you can try lionfish in the islands at other times: restaurants where you might find this new delicacy include Wahoo’s Bistro & Patio in St George’s and Barracuda Grill in Hamilton.

Puerto Rico

Some of Puerto Rico’s most notable sustainable tourism initiatives have sprouted up inland, away from the island’s famous white sand beaches. El Yunque National Forest, the only tropical rainforest in the US National Forest system, is just 25km south-east of the capital, San Juan. El Yunque occupies just over 1% of Puerto Rico’s land, but provides nearly 20% of its fresh water, and helps regulate climate conditions and absorb impacts from major storms.

Guests staying in two Wyndham resorts near El Yunque can now donate $1 per night to the Fundación Amigos de El Yunque (Friends of El Yunque Foundation) to support conservation efforts in the forest. The organisation is working with other accommodation options with a view to extending this opportunity and gathering even more funds for conservation in this beautiful and important habitat.

The island’s farm-to-table eating scene is flourishing, too. Puerto Rico imports around 85% of its food – but since Hurricane
Maria temporarily disrupted supply chains in 2017, many Puerto Ricans turned the disaster into an opportunity, taking advantage of fertile soil to produce more sustainably grown ingredients – for example, at El Pretexto, an innovative culinary farm lodge. amigosdelyunque.org; elpretextopr.com

Napa Valley

CALIFORNIA USA

California’s famed Napa Valley is home to hundreds of vineyards and wineries – estimates vary, though 475 is a widely cited figure – but only 16 have achieved Napa Green’s Gold Level certification, a comprehensive, locally run certification programme and sustainability resource for the valley’s wine industry. Its 90 certified wineries and 31 certified vineyards have implemented more than 120 social and ecological standards, from recycling, composting and reducing greenhouse gas emissions (through farming practices such as using carbon-capturing biochar to enhance soil fertility) to commitments on social equity and inclusion.

Meanwhile, those that have achieved the Gold Level certification are the best of the best, using absolutely no herbicides or bee-killing neonicotinoids. Among these, Tres Sabores is not only beloved of one of our editors for its low-key, friendly atmosphere, accessible prices and outstanding reds, but also notable as one of the very few wineries in the area founded and owned by a woman.