Day-trippers will have to pay €5 to visit Italian city under scheme designed to protect it from excess tourism
Authorities in Venice have been accused of transforming the famous lagoon city into a “theme park” as a long-mooted entrance fee for day trippers comes into force.
Venice is the first major city in the world to enact such a scheme. The €5 (£4.30) charge, which comes into force today, is aimed at protecting the Unesco world heritage site from the effects of excessive tourism by deterring day trippers and, according to the mayor, Luigi Brugnaro, making the city “livable” again.
But several residents’ committees and associations have planned protests for Thursday, arguing that the fee will do nothing to resolve the issue.
“I can tell you that almost the entire city is against it,” claimed Matteo Secchi, who leads Venessia.com, a residents’ activist group. “You can’t impose an entrance fee to a city; all they’re doing is transforming it into a theme park. This is a bad image for Venice … I mean, are we joking?”
I find it surprising that it’s unpopular with the residents
My (admittedly naive) understanding was that tourism keeps increasing and there’s no way to build more space, so Venice has become overcrowded and is potentially at risk of sinking?
Sure it’s not great to have to impose a restriction like this, but there aren’t many other ways to reduce the number of people going to a place that they want to go to.
Other than the poor optics of charging entrance as if it’s a theme park, the fee might also embolden some of the more obnoxious tourists in behaving like they would at an ACTUAL theme park rather than how they would as guests in a “real” city, in order to “get their money’s worth”.
Thing is, €5 isn’t all that much. I’m not sure who this is going to deter other than shoestring backpackers and people who fly RyanAir. I’d fully expect that price to increase in the future.
My guess is that the term “residents” actually refers to greedy business and hotel owners which are the reason this rule is necessary in the first place.
Residents, commuters, students and children under the age of 14 are exempt, as are tourists who stay overnight.
So they are just attempting to bully the worst kind of tourists out which is totally fair.
Yeah it reads like they do want less tourists but don’t agree with the way they are handling it. Maybe a pride thing, with the theme park comment.
Maybe the inland residents the ones that are protesting… what we call Venice doesent look to have a lot of residents apart from some particular places
I suspect it’s more unpopular with souvenir shop owners than anyone else.
This article is surely taking a group of people and holding them as being representative of the populace as a whole. In fact, much reporting indicates that locals are sick of tourists and tourists, especially on cruise ships, are actively destroying the environment. Venice has already banned cruise ships from certain parts as a result. I call bullshit on this article.
the obvious solution is to only let in a set number of people per day. This is just a nickel and dime scheme.
This does kinda feel like when Cartman had his own amusement park that nobody was allowed to go to
They should honestly increase the cost to something more akin to a theme park. There isn’t that much value that the city brings in beyond it being a tourist destination.
Maybe go with circus prices instead since they both charge you money to see a bunch of clowns.
The fee is only charged on certain days, I believe a total of 29 days this year, to dissuade people from visiting on those days that are considered to be the busiest.
29 days is counted until the end of the three months trial in July. So it’s every weekend + every holiday, like 120 days per year
You have to pay 5€ to visit a giant sewer city with no trees in sight and two people per every square meter. A bargain.
Shush you, Venice is magnificent. Wouldn’t want to live there but it’s an extraordinary place absolutely worth experiencing. Ancient, labyrinthine, palaces and churches everywhere, it’s like stepping into the Renaissance.
Good point. But I enjoyed “shush you” the most
I’m upvoting you for adding to the conversation even though we have different opinions. Sadly, people don’t understand how the moderation system is supposed to work.
You never been, obviously.
You don’t care for culture, gotcha. Now do Disneyland!
“Venice is the first major city in the world to enact such a scheme.”
London has been charging an entry fee for it’s downtown core for years now.
https://www.visitlondon.com/traveller-information/getting-around-london/congestion-charge
That’s only for vehicles. It isn’t the same thing.
It’s essentially the same thing. Too many people are coming, so charge them a fee. The only reason Venice is per person and not per vehicle is that it’s an island, it’s not like you can drive there.
It may seem like that to the average american, but nobody with more than 1 braincell drives in London. Even when your the congestion charge, you’re basically always better off walking or taking the Underground.
This prevents cars, not people. They’re very much not the same thing.
You can drive in Venice. Well, you could if you’d removed all the tourists.
The London thing does not apply to pedestrians
There is a difference in intent.
The congestion charge in London and other cities is just for cars whole the cities generally provide good mass transit across the toll line.
Venice is charging an admission fee to all tourists no matter how they arrive. Given how low the fee is, all it will probably do is raise revenue for the local government.
It’s essentially the same thing. Too many people are coming, so charge them a fee.
No, it’s not the same thing. Cars don’t have a place in the cities, cities are for humans.
