philat98

The tourists that arrived in Venice yesterday dont seem to be very honest or generous. There were around 100k registrations and only 8k paid €5. No fines were handed out.
€5 is probably less than you might pay for a coffee.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68898441

Finknottle

Seems like a good idea to me...

daniel_t

I certainly wouldn't mind paying a fiver to visit Venice at weekends - but I never do it anyway.

Spot checks, mmm. I wonder how the Italians are going to enforce it. Seal off the city with border posts? Slap tourists without a hotel reservation or residency in Venice with a hefty fine?

Why anybody has come up with something as impractical as this is beyond me, but I shouldn't be surprised. They could have added five euros to all train fares to and from Venice. Tourists with hotel reservations would get a refund in the room prices. Local residents could claim it back from their town hall. I'm not sure this tourist tax does anything to solve their housing crisis though.

Geordieborn

€5 to visit an open sewer, and no before you ask I've never been and never will.

37100

Like London and the Thames? Or any city built before modern sewr system.😉

philat98

That is what someone told me when I planned a visit they were wrong. If you go out of season it is a marvellous place.

Geordieborn

In truth I don't particularly like cities, towns like Sulmona, Atri I can enjoy at times, likes of Florence, Pisa are not for me, although Siena I did enjoy, but that seems more like a town to me.

jonwel

I've been to Venice three times in over 40 years living in Italy, the last time in 2004. I have to say that it wasn't smelly and also the British visitors I was showing around were pleasantly surprised. It seems to be obligatory to talk about "open-sewer Venice", regardless of what it's really like! However, we didn't go in the summer and maybe things have worsened over the last 20 years, although I'd take that with a pinch of salt. Go on, Geordie, visit the place, at least once in your life, preferably in spring or autumn!

Meanwhile in Britain the privatised water companies pump untreated sewage into the rivers but are still allowed to pay a 7% dividend to "investors"!

Geordieborn

Water is essential and should have always been in public hands....

jiminalpago

The Venice sewage system was overhauled in the late '90s but, even before then, I never found it particularly pongy in any season; I lived there from '94 to 2003.
The geography of the city means that it is possible to make a good fist of controlling entry. The statistics, though, are a bit of a surprise: do they mean that the congestion isn't down to tourists (who, I suspect, will pay without a murmur) but to Italians from near and far who are testing their fiddling skills?

daniel_t

According to the Courier (Corriere), Venice city council have filled 723,000 euros in their coffers in a week - from 25 April to 2 May. The initial cost of getting it up and running is 3 million euros. (3 May 2024)

On the other hand, Sadiq Khan's ULEZ scheme is estimated to bring in £250 million (£50 million on operating costs) between August 2023 and August 2024. (Source: FOI-1691-2324 freedom of information request)

philat98

I think the €5 charge will quickly become €10.