Venice's access fee doesn't reduce tourism: it selects who can afford it • Hacker News Board

Re: Venice's access fee doesn't reduce tourism: it selects who can afford it

#11

Post by throw310822 » Tue, Jul 14, 2026, 11:20 AM UTC

trikko wrote: post #6

throw310822 wrote: post #3

@trikko: increases in prices reduce demand, there is no question about it. The data from 2024-25 means nothing: if the visitors kept increasing means they would have increased even more without the fee. The claim "it filters visitors by income rather than reducing them" is nonsense: there isn't a max capacity (the ticket applies only to day tourists anyway) so those who are filtered out are not replaced by anyone els…

There are a lot of misconceptions and biases in that statement. What exactly is meant by a 'modern city'? Venice is both a provincial and a regional capital. It has one of the largest international airports in Italy, as well as a major train station. It has public transportation to get you from one side of the city to the other. Surprisingly, it also lends itself very well to infrastructure upgrades: for example, bec…

I mean a city that has no thriving businesses, companies and industry that attract people to go to live there. The only thriving industry of Venice (apart, of course, from tourism) is the cultural industry (museums, foundations) and the university- which I suspect is the second major source of demand for housing. You mention the public sector but that's entirely artificial, partly also driven by tourism, and sluggish.

In most medium Italian cities (though with its actual population Venice doesn't even qualify as medium anymore) people park their cars right on their doorstep or two minutes away. Workers can jump in their car in the morning and commute to the office, elderly people can drive anywhere. Big cities have multiple efficient and interconnected public transport systems for those who work in the neighborhood and don't want to use their cars. In Venice, even cycling is impossible. I do understand the charm and the privilege of living there, but it's undeniably a choice with many trade-offs. I wish there was a way to make the city attractive again not for the canals and the alleys but for the actual job opportunities you get there, but I have to admit that given the general state of the country and the addiction to tourism the outlook isn't good. In the meanwhile the city turns more and more into an amusement park and a museum.

Re: Venice's access fee doesn't reduce tourism: it selects who can afford it

#12

Post by trikko » Tue, Jul 14, 2026, 12:44 PM UTC

throw310822 wrote: post #11

trikko wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are a lot of misconceptions and biases in that statement. What exactly is meant by a 'modern city'? Venice is both a provincial and a regional capital. It has one of the largest international airports in Italy, as well as a major train station. It has public transportation to get you from one side of the city to the other. Surprisingly, it also lends itself very well to infrastructure upgrades: for example, bec…

I mean a city that has no thriving businesses, companies and industry that attract people to go to live there. The only thriving industry of Venice (apart, of course, from tourism) is the cultural industry (museums, foundations) and the university- which I suspect is the second major source of demand for housing. You mention the public sector but that's entirely artificial, partly also driven by tourism, and sluggish…

A few things get conflated here, and they matter.

You are describing the island, but the Comune of Venice is around the 12th most populous municipality in Italy (roughly 250,000 people). Most of that population does not live on the island at all, it lives on the mainland: Mestre and Marghera are part of the Comune di Venezia too. The 49,000 figure is only the historic centre. So "with its population Venice does not even qualify as medium" is measuring the wrong thing.

The mainland side is not a tourism monoculture. Porto Marghera is one of the country's historic industrial and port districts and there are medium and large firms of national relevance. I work for a medium-sized company in Mestre myself, and my commute from the island is under 10 minutes by car (the island is tiny, and the car parks are easy to reach, especially from a residential neighbourhood).

Venice is not a generic "medium town", so comparing it to one is off. It is a regional capital (of the Veneto), a metropolitan city, a major university and cultural hub, and a port. The public sector here is not "artificial", it is regional and metropolitan government, the port authority, real administrative functions. If you want a fair benchmark, compare it to Florence or Bologna, not to a provincial town where you park on your doorstep.

You do not need a car on the island because the water public transport runs across the whole city all day and through the night, and the place is small enough to cross on foot. For anyone working on the mainland, the parking, the train station and the jobs are minutes away. A car-free historic city is something most cities are now trying to engineer on purpose. It is a feature, not only a trade-off.

And here is the key point that flips your framing: people are not leaving the centre because there are no jobs. They are leaving because owners can make far more converting a flat into a short-term rental than renting it long term, so even someone with a solid job in the metro area cannot find a home in the centre. It is not weak demand for living there, it is demand being outbid by tourism. That is exactly why the lever is housing regulation, not the entry ticket. The university, the culture, the port and the administration already give the city an economic base. What is missing is keeping the homes available to the people who would happily live and work here.

Re: Venice's access fee doesn't reduce tourism: it selects who can afford it

#13

Post by throw310822 » Tue, Jul 14, 2026, 5:51 PM UTC

trikko wrote: post #12

throw310822 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean a city that has no thriving businesses, companies and industry that attract people to go to live there. The only thriving industry of Venice (apart, of course, from tourism) is the cultural industry (museums, foundations) and the university- which I suspect is the second major source of demand for housing. You mention the public sector but that's entirely artificial, partly also driven by tourism, and sluggish…

A few things get conflated here, and they matter. You are describing the island, but the Comune of Venice is around the 12th most populous municipality in Italy (roughly 250,000 people). Most of that population does not live on the island at all, it lives on the mainland: Mestre and Marghera are part of the Comune di Venezia too. The 49,000 figure is only the historic centre. So "with its population Venice does not e…

I'm talking about Venice proper because that's what we're talking about: there is no ticket for Mestre, no overtourism and no housing shortage, and you can park your car in front of your house, jump in it, and drive 15 minutes to the countryside.

Yes Venice has all those government offices, but how many people do they employ and what salaries do they provide? What's the economy of a city in which the only employer is an inefficient bureaucracy resistant to all change?

The depopulation of Venice started well before the explosion of mass tourism- it had already lost half of its inhabitants by the mid-1980s. That's well before Ryanair or Airbnb. But I totally agree that mass tourism sucks- it turns the streets into a carousel of shops selling the same useless crap, makes the city unliveable, drives up the prices of the houses. That's why I understand the 50 euro ticket- it's a desperate measure for a city, but it will reduce the amount of tourists, especially the least motivated ones and in the peak times of the year.

But any serious attempt at keeping the city alive should take in account a progressive, dramatic reduction in income from visitors- which means closed souvenir shops, closed hotels and restaurants and cafes, so angry business and property owners- and find an idea to fill back the space and the economy of the city with new jobs. This requires clarity, long term planning and willingness to change, all things that in Italy are in very scarce supply. (Obvious disclosure, I'm from Italy)

Re: Venice's access fee doesn't reduce tourism: it selects who can afford it

#14

Post by Sabinus » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 12:23 AM UTC

trikko wrote: post #2

I'm a Venetian resident; I wrote this. Happy to answer questions. The short version: the day-tripper "access fee" is often framed as a fix for overtourism, but the data from the 2024–2025 trials shows arrivals still rising: it filters visitors by income rather than reducing them. Meanwhile the real driver of the city emptying out is housing: short-term rentals now outnumber residents. I also sketch a concrete policy…

How do you know that the problem isn't that the access fee hasn't been set high enough to meaningfully reduce demand?

(Also to the community, please don't flag normal comments if you don't like them. Downvote is fine, but rageflagging just prevents other people from having potentially productive conversations)

Re: Venice's access fee doesn't reduce tourism: it selects who can afford it

#15

Post by trikko » Wed, Jul 15, 2026, 12:37 PM UTC

Sabinus wrote: post #14

trikko wrote: post #2

I'm a Venetian resident; I wrote this. Happy to answer questions. The short version: the day-tripper "access fee" is often framed as a fix for overtourism, but the data from the 2024–2025 trials shows arrivals still rising: it filters visitors by income rather than reducing them. Meanwhile the real driver of the city emptying out is housing: short-term rentals now outnumber residents. I also sketch a concrete policy…

How do you know that the problem isn't that the access fee hasn't been set high enough to meaningfully reduce demand? (Also to the community, please don't flag normal comments if you don't like them. Downvote is fine, but rageflagging just prevents other people from having potentially productive conversations)

[flagged]