Was in Venice summer 2017, and having never been prior, my wife and I were surprised at how empty it was after 5pm. How could this be? It was wall-to-wall people all day -- many in tours that would sometimes just stop in the middle of a narrow corridor. We realized what this and all the other articles about Venice tourism describe -- that most tourists only come for the day.<p>The evenings and nights there were the best part of the day -- not only because the temp dropped, and the light was beautiful -- but because it became an entire different city without the droves of people. It became trivial to sit down at random restaurants and find quiet.<p>It's a good start they're going to start charging for entry to the island for the sake of the residents and preserving the city. Though not sure they need all this infra for tracking within the island itself to accomplish their goals.
I'm a little surprised by the reactions to this. I mean, your location data is already sucked up by so many sources and re-sold [0]. That is what we should be fighting, not systems meant to help preserve a city that is deteroriarhting.<p>[0] - <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/your-smartphones-location-data-is-worth-big-money-to-wall-street-1541131260" rel="nofollow">https://www.wsj.com/articles/your-smartphones-location-data-...</a>
The headline isn't really misleading but it implies a slightly different problem from what seems to be real crux of this (or so they say):<p><i>"As you can see, the number of daytrippers -- is steep," says Bettini. This is crucial information, because these "hit-and-run" tourists are usually charged with causing the most damage to the struggling city. They tend to come in from other parts of Italy -- often from beach resorts on a bad weather day -- and rarely spend money, bringing their own food and eating illicit picnics on bridges and on waterfronts. But since they don't stay overnight, they cannot be counted by the authorities -- until now.</i><p>I don't understand exactly why not staying overnight means they can't be counted, and another quote does mention too many visitors in specific areas, but the problem is apparently bored domestic travelers who can't go to the beach, not over-tourism in general. Maybe a messaging based approach would work better than this rather intrusive tracking system but who knows, I'm not Italian. I've been to Venice though, it's really nice, if you get the opportunity you should take it (respectfully), even if you have to agree to be tracked.<p>Also - not sure if commenters are aware of this, but I'm pretty sure every hotel in Venice already keeps passports and IDs on file and reports who is there every day to the local authorities.
As someone who has had the opportunity to go, I would gladly accept the tracking / privacy intrusion for a short visit. Well worth it IMHO, and happy to support making travel to these sort of rare gems more sustainable and possibly even more enjoyable. My pro tip: go in the winter. You’ll have the place mostly to yourself.<p><a href="https://www.dropbox.com/s/x4c73z3xi3ca630/IMG_8157.JPG?dl=0" rel="nofollow">https://www.dropbox.com/s/x4c73z3xi3ca630/IMG_8157.JPG?dl=0</a>
Some things that used to be exclusive are no longer exclusive.<p>And they scale poorly.<p>Every museum and monument in Western Europe suffers from this problem.<p>Sometimes there are tricks. If there's a "City Pass" that lets you skip lines, it can be a great value. Sometimes showing up early in the morning or late in the evening is a great strategy. It sounds like the latter is the case in Venice.
>The system not only counts visitors in the vicinity of cameras posted around the city, but it also, in conjunction with TIM (Telecom Italia, Italy's largest telecommunications provider), crunches who they are and where they come from.<p>>The authorities can see where these new arrivals are from by analyzing their phone data (the information is all aggregated automatically, so no personal details can be gleaned).<p>In case anyone wanted to know only the "how"
Yeah treat tourists as cattle they're going to love it...<p>It seems COVID is the great excuse to let all the Orwellian bs loose.<p>The state of the world is hopeless, especially when witnessing the apathy of the masses that will accept anything.