The trampling of Venice shows why tourism must
change after Covid-19
Neal E
Robbins
Coronavirus has given hotspots like the besieged
Italian port breathing space – and a vision of a new, greener kind of tourism
‘Venice’s residents want a ban on outsized cruise
ships, and improved treatment of the lagoon that is vital to the city’s life.’
Published
onFri 19 Jun 2020 15.05 BST
Before
Covid-19, the tourist industry was the largest employer by sector on the planet,
giving work to one in every 11 people. And when the emergency ends, it will
surely resurge – but should it return in the way it was before? Maybe now,
finally, is a good time to rethink what tourism should be.
Before the
coronavirus outbreak, the number of global tourists was predicted to balloon to
1.8 billion international arrivals a year by 2030. In 1950 that number was at
25 million. That huge increase cuts two ways. Tourism supports jobs, often
bringing vital economic sustenance to historic or remote places. But
over-tourism has a clear downside for the frailest destinations, like Machu
Picchu in Peru, for many historic city centres, like New Orleans or Dubrovnik,
and for the location I know best, Venice. There, 30 million annual visitors
exert enormous demands on the residents, the heritage and the environment,
changing tourism into a corrosive force.
In the
years just before the coronavirus outbreak I spent months in the city of canals
and culture interviewing Venetians about their lives. Invariably, the first
thing they wanted to tell me about was the effects of mass tourism; how, since
the 1990s, it has pushed out residents; how streets and squares can become dangerously
overcrowded; how it has pushed up housing costs and destroyed local shops that
now all cater to sandwich-eating, souvenir-buying tourists and little else; how
it allows overweening sightseers to invade weddings, baptisms and funerals at
its religious places. The social ties Venice once enjoyed, its rhythm of life,
even the vibrant artisanal trades, are now almost a thing of the past.
On top of
all that, the millions of tourists coming to Venice put pressure on the
environment by generating mountains of refuse, through the heavy use of the
vaporetti water ferries and taxis, by over-stressing ancient buildings, and
with the moisture in their collective breath on artworks. The hundreds of
visits from floating resorts – massive cruise ships each with up to 4,000
passengers – add to air pollution and cause erosion of the area’s sensitive
lagoon environment.
The
population of Venice, more than 170,000 after the second world war, has dropped
steadily to some 52,000 today. Remaining residents still feel fortunate to live
in a city of such beauty, many believing their culture survives despite the
onslaught, but they also grieve at the losses, lose heart, and move away at a
rate of 1,000 a year to homes on the mainland. A Venice without Venetians –
without significant numbers of permanent residents – is predicted for as early
as 2030.
It is no
exaggeration to say that mass tourism – adding to Venice’s existing issues with
mismanagement of the environment, corruption, political stasis and now the
climate emergency – is bringing the community, the lagoon and a fabulous
heritage to within a hair’s breadth of collapse.
Tourism was
a fairly benign source of livelihood for Venice until the world itself took a
step-change some 30 years ago, when a new economics helped bring on cheap air
travel, faster communications and an accelerated globalisation. When management
of the city was handed over to the market with few controls, Venice was turned
into an asset for stripping. Regional changes to Italian laws in the 1990s
unleashed rampant property trading that deepened the effects of mass tourism.
Yet
Venetians believe that they can still save Venice, and many are fighting for it
and demanding that politicians do more. They want them to manage tourist
numbers and pass new laws to govern property sales and rentals and put an end
to the Airbnb-led free-for-all that is pushing residents out. They call for a
focus on long-term accommodation at sustainable costs and more jobs through
economic diversification. They want more environmental measures, especially a
ban on outsized cruise ships, and improved treatment of the lagoon that is
vital to Venice’s life.
This has
come into sharp focus in the months-long Covid-19 breathing space, when the
sudden emptying of the city restored a lost tranquility, along with fish, swans
and cormorants to canals no longer churned by excessive traffic. Most of all,
it ignited the hope that this difficult moment for the world could eventually
offer a turning point.
The need in
Venice, and in so many other destinations, is for a new tourism, one that also
benefits residents – not one organised around speculators, landlords, and
traveller’s demands. We visitors must see tourism less as an unquestionable
entitlement and more as a part of our responsibility to sustain life on Earth.
This must ultimately include limiting tourist numbers.
Tourism
after coronavirus requires a new mindset. Maybe we can’t visit places so
casually; maybe we will need to sacrifice the freedom to drop in at any time
and go anywhere as fast as we can or by whatever means suits us. We need to
accept life – and visiting – at a slower pace.
Beyond that
we need to end our passivity as tourists and see destinations as people’s
homes, not just attractions. We should acquaint ourselves with local conditions
and be ready to refrain from travelling if authorities listen only to monied
interests and fail to foster local livelihoods and protect the local
environment. Greener attitudes will help fragile destinations to live on – and
allow masterpieces such as Venice to survive for generations to come.
• Neal E
Robbins is the author of Venice, an Odyssey: Hope and Anger in the Iconic City,
out in July
 |
An
evocative and fascinating portrait of Venice, Italy-the ultimate city where
there are stories on every street and in every doorway, nook and cranny.
What is it
about Venice? The city empowers creativity, and is a place of art, artisans,
and artistry, with a rich cultural and intellectual history. It's also been
facing major challenges-including a fragile ecosystem, significant depopulation
and political volatility-leading to fears that the city will become an
inauthentic museum for tourists.
Neal
Robbins examines this Italian city, reflecting on the changes he has seen since
he first encountered it in the late 1970s-living with a Venetian family while
he was a high school student-to quite recently, when, after nearly 50 years and
a career as international journalist, he returned to see how the city has
endured and changed.
Drawing on
his journalism background, Robbins brings deep research, curiosity, and keen
insights to his personal experiences of the city, delivering a
multi-dimensional profile of this enchanting place. Taking the reader down the
city's streets, into its churches and cafes, and onboard boats traveling
through its canals and out into its vital lagoon, Robbins shares the city's
history, symbols, politics, and struggles, as well as its sounds, smells,
animals, and many of its remarkable denizens. He draws upon exclusive
interviews with Venetians from all walks of life-artisans, historians, a bank
employee, authors, parents, a psychologist, an oceanographer, a funeral
director, a nobleman and a former pop star-to share multiple personal
interpretations of Venice as it was, as it is and what it can be.
Readers
will come away with a rich understanding and appreciation of Venice's history
and culture, the challenges it faces, and what it shows us all about the
future.
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