Visiting Venice will look a bit different by next summer, at least for those who come for the day, as the city implements a reservation-and-turnstile system for day visitors, designed to reduce the overwhelming number of visitors in recent years.
The turnstile plan, trialed in 2018 (photo above) will require advance reservation on the city’s site, and will not be sold on ‘day of,’ allowing the city to monitor and plan how many will be visiting. The fee will vary between €3 and €10 depending on season. The plan was to have gone into effect last year but was postponed because of the pandemic.
During the long absence of mass tourism, the city found its waters much cleaner and clearer and the city more livable, and there is widespread support for avoiding a return to the days when as many as 80,000 visitors a day entered the city. The turnstile system won’t apply to hotel guests, who already pay a tourism tax.
Those who do come will notice another big difference, with the ban on large cruise ships anchoring directly in the city is in effect. Both changes required approval by Italy’s national government; the years-long campaign to move the ships, larger than the city’s buildings, only got final approval after Unesco threatened to pull the city’s World Heritage status.
