Rome officials have won court approval for their plan to de-densify traffic in the city’s center by removing one of the city’s most common sights: tourism buses. The buses will be limited in some areas, and banned altogether from a zone that includes the Colosseum and Pantheon.
Opponents of the new rules, which take effect January 1, say it will hurt tourism and won’t clear the air, or the traffic, because the buses produce less emissions than the cars they say will replace them.
In the rest of the city, where buses will be allowed, they will have to purchase day-entry tickets instead of an annual license. That will give the city more control over how many buses are in use each day. The cost of the tickets will be scaled based on pollution, with diesel buses paying the highest rate and electric ones the lowest.
I sympathise with the authorities in Rome. On a recent visit to Berlin we found the constant stream of sight-seeing buses a real nuisance. Whether the ban might have unintended consequences, such as an increase in car traffic, is another question.