Visiting Venice ?

I didn’t open your link because I know from an Italian on-line newspaper the subject of your post. As long as you’re staying overnight at a hotel, there’s no issue. I think most of us on the forum would fall into this category. I was in Venice a few weeks ago; wonderful to be back!

Silly thing to do. A hassle to tourists and who will refuse to visit Venice for 10 Euros or so a day? Just a revenue generating tax. It will not reduce the number of tourists at all. Might as well put up Disney type turn-styles.

I didn’t read the article, but I imagine this is aimed at cruise ship passengers, many of whom eat aboard ship and don’t buy anything. Therefore, they don’t contribute to the economy.

I can’t see such a small amount deterring people from entry.

The fee is quite small and I don't imagine that most tourists won't mind paying it. I do wonder if it will create any significant revenue. The logistics of enforcement would be quite complex and I imagine costly. I think in the end, it will end up being a voluntary donation from responsible tourists and largely ignored by the rest, including the Venetian govenment.

I felt the article was interesting and informative, hence my reason for posting it. It certainly would not deter me from visiting , but I do feel it is a step in the right direction for controlling the problem for the Venetians . Not every step in any sort of regulation is simply a crass money grab .

I wonder if it's aimed at the cruise crowds? I imagine it's tacked on to the price of the cruise and mostly invisible to cruisers.

It's hard to imagine them charging a fee to people getting off the train in Venice. I guess I'll find out next time I'm there.

Based on the article and others I've read in the past few weeks, the government doesn't expect it to be anything more than a method to provide a crystal ball for daily visitors.
The city’s costs for implementing and managing the system are expected to be considerable, so the city doesn’t foresee that the fees will do much more than recover its investment.

As for enforcement, there will only be 10-15 officers to do random checks on people, so I do wonder if people will risk not bothering with a pass. Hopefully not since it only costs 3-10 Euros.

Fun fact from another New York Times article; 73% of visitors to Venice are Daytripper's, and 7% of those are are from cruise ships. So if the politicians are to be believed and this is to gauge how many tourists to expect each day, then it couldn't have been to only target cruise ship daytrippers because they'd already have a handle on that based on how many ships were docking. I would expect the cruise ships to profit though with a 'convenience' offer to sell the passes to its passengers at an inflated cost.

Can't wait to see the You Tube videos of these confrontations when this takes place. The average tourist will look very puzzled when a stranger approaches them and asks to see their "paid reservation to visit Venice".

When the cruise ships start emptying out it's like a stampede. I understand the rationale.

The city pays a lot of money to clean up the trash and repair damages left by tourists. Many of the people who day trip to Venice, whether on a cruise ship or from a nearby town, contribute very little to the city's economy, especially from cruise ships where all their meals are paid for. And if you sleep in Venice you pay a per night hotel tax. Why shouldn't day trippers pay something? When I stay in Venice, all my meals come from the local economy (as well as the manpower to provide them). Cruisers's meals are included onboard so many eat a big breakfast and dinner on the ship, maybe even bring picnic lunches in with them. Even people who stay in, say, Padua, may only eat one light meal in Venice.

As I understand it, another benefit may be limited the number of day trippers by only selling a limited number of entries per day.

Like all ports of call, there are already per head port fees that the cruise lines have to pay for their passengers when docking anywhere in the world. They could be raised in Venice for those ships still docking there, without much fanfare. But this sounds like a broader effort. It seems like a reasonable way to get revenue to cover the costs to the municipality of dealing with hordes of tourists adding little to the normal revenue stream. That is, if its not corrupted and turned into another bureaucratic mess (sorry, too many Donna Leon books). I haven't heard any other reasonable alternatives.

Places like Venice (and Macchu Picchu, Yosemite, Yellowstone) that are being loved to death are trying whatever they can to limit the load. And pay the bills. It's just another travel expense, nothing you can do or worry about.

We were on a Royal Caribbean cruise a few weeks ago that landed in Varenna--70 mi south of Venice. We took a train up to Venice for 2 nights--my 10th visit in 52 years. Other cruises are being diverted into Transvere just north of Venice
The biggest ships are no longer going into Venice where damage to the lagoon has been experienced. $ Billions have been spent on an underwater gate system to minimize the flooding of the islands. Cruise passengers may be slightly fewer in the future.

David, did you mean Ravenna and Trieste?