TOLL
Article reserved for subscribers
Since April 25, visitors who spend less than 24 hours in the city suffocated by overtourism have had to pay an “access fee”. An experimental measure which divides locals and holidaymakers alike.
To combat the rising waters, Venice had invoked “Moses”. Since 2020, the dikes of the “Mose” (for Electromechanical Experimental Module, a project launched in 2003) have stood at the entrance to the lagoon to slow down thehigh water. To cope with the wave of tourists, the City of the Doges did not, however, choose a biblical acronym. It must be said that for decades, the city has now lived mainly from its visitors, who provide more than 65% of jobs. However, along the Grand Canal, overtourism is now seen as a plague. “Sometimes, in certain very narrow streets, there are so many people that people are literally stuck, they can no longer move forward, laments Giorgia, painting a homemade mask in a shop on Calle del Capeler. There are crowds, but they don’t even stop to enter.”
In July 2023, the World Heritage Committee, which depends on UNESCO, even recommended including Venice on the “list of World Heritage in danger”. U
