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Venice Entry Tax Gets Approved

Starting from this year, a visit to Venice will become a little more expensive as the city’s authorities finally approved the new entry tax for all tourists. Depending on the time of the year, visitors will have to pay a tax ranging from 2.5 to 10 euro. The Italian parliament approved the new tax as well, and the money collected will be sent to the budget already this year.

It is not a secret that Venice is one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world, and a tourist tax is a great help to the city that has to cope with many challenges. The tourist tax existed before, but it was paid only by tourists who had a hotel in Venice or an apartment booked at least for one day. Nowadays, all tourists from cruise ships and even day-trippers will be obliged to pay this tax. The length of a visit doesn’t make any difference starting from this year.

The mayor of Venice, Luigi Brugnaro, said they had to impose the new tax because the city needed extra funding to cope with the rubbish left by day-trippers. Venice is widely recognized to have overtourism problems. The city, which is not that big in size, is visited by more than 20 million visitors a year. For less than 300 thousand residents of the city, it has become a challenge to cope with the influx of tourists. Locals have to tolerate constant crowds and noise from wheelie suitcases, as well as disrespectful behavior.

Every day, four or five large cruise ships appear in the Giudecca Canal and unload thousands of people. These day-trippers leave behind tons of litter and change the historic look of the city. Overtourism has become such a big problem for Venice that it was decided to install gates at the two entry points to the lagoon. These gates are generally open, but when too many ships arrive and the number of tourists is too high, the gates become closed, blocking the way to the Rialto Bridge and St Mark’s Square. Only people with Venice hotel bookings or holders of Venezia Unica pass are allowed to enter in that case. By the way, the pass can be bought by everyone for 40 euro.

Together with the new tax, the city now has new fines of 500 euro. They are charged for loitering and littering on bridges, swimming in canals, using noisy wheeled suitcases in the historic center, picnicking in public areas, and wearing swimwear while sightseeing. Finally, tourists with cars who arrive from the mainland via Ponta della Liberta can be prohibited to enter if they don’t have a booked parking.

05.01.2019

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