[sarcher]

It's a mirror of the intracity highway issue. Access is improved for people who don't live in a specific location, and the externalities of this decision are dumped onto local citizens. The desirable location ends up hollowed-out, as no more geography is generated but instead the existing geography sliced away and allocated to visitors. They become destinations, more theme park than city.

It's well accepted that the highway boom of twentieth century had a negative impact on city life. That's why the Big Dig put that city-cutting highway underground in Boston, and (one reason) why the viaduct in Seattle is going underground, and why the I-93 corridor in Massachusetts became a public transit route instead. Here's a longer list:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freeway_removal

Transforming private residences into hotel rooms makes it easier to visit and harder to live. Acknowledging this doesn't mean people don't like Airbnb, it just means that both the positive and the negative impacts of their business model are being discussed.

[mrosett]

For what it’s worth, I think I generate more positive externalities per day as a visitor than when I lived there.

[ryanbrunner]

Perhaps on balance, but those externalities aren't shared by the city as a whole - local businesses might benefit from you visiting, but individuals living in the city are probably overall negatively affected due to increased rent from tightened supply, lack of community due to increasingly more apartments being rented out to AirBnB users, and other negative effects.