Venice launches its five-euro daily ticket to stop mass tourism

Venice launched its entry ticket for single-day visitors this Thursday, a measure to combat mass tourism but which raises reluctance among residents who do not want their city to become a “museum”.

The city, the first to implement a device of this type, sold about 10,000 tickets online, at a price of 5 euros ($5.30), the deputy head of Tourism, Simone Venturini, told AFP.

These tickets, which come in the form of QR codes, They have to present themselves to the conductors, deployed in various places, but above all at the Santa Lucía train station, the main entrance to this famous town, a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Although the rate is moderate since the system does not impose a limit on daily visitors, municipal authorities hope that it will deter some of the tourists who crowd its alleys and the bridges over its canals on the busiest days.

“I think it’s good because this will perhaps stop the tourist influx in Venice,” says Sylvain Pélerin, a French tourist who has visited the city often for half a century, proudly showing his pass.

In the lobby of the elegant Santa Lucia train station, ticket offices have been installed to inform and sell tickets.

Venice thus becomes the first city in the world to impose an entrance ticket on its visitors, as if it were a theme park.

The problem of excess tourism has generated rejection movements in other placesespecially in Spain, which have led the authorities to try to reconcile the well-being of the inhabitants with a crucial economic sector.

For Venturini, it is “above all to discourage local tourism from the inhabitants of the Veneto region, who can visit Venice whenever they want.”

Mayor Luigi Brugnaro recognized in April that it is an “experiment”, whose development will be closely followed by other tourist cities in the world that are in a similar situation.

Its commune, one of the most visited in the world, has already banned large cruise ships from docking in the city.

At its busiest times, Venice has 100,000 overnight tourists, in addition to tens of thousands of daily visitors. This contrasts with the approximately 50,000 residents of the city center, which continues to decrease.

The project, however, has a very limited scope.: By 2024, only 29 days of high tourist influx will be affected by the new ratewhich begins this Thursday, a holiday in Italy, and will apply almost every weekend from May to July.

The ticket is only intended for day tourists who enter the old town between 08:30 and 16:00 local. They have to upload their QR code from the website (https://cda.ve.it), also available in English, Spanish, French and German.

Tourists who try to walk around without paying the entrance fee could be punished with a fine of between 50 and 300 euros ($53 and $320), although local authorities have already said that they will try to persuade visitors first, before punishing them.

Tourists who spend at least one night in the city will not be affected and will receive a free QR code, and there are several exceptions planned, especially for children under 14 years of age and students.

But some residents do not see the measure favorably, because they think it is an attack on their freedom of movement and one more step to turn the city into a museum.

“We are not a museum or a nature reserve, but a city, we should not pay” for access, criticizes Marina Dodino, who is part of the local residents’ association, ARCI Venezia. A demonstration is planned during the day to protest against the measure.