As is well-known by now, UNESCO will meet this month, and when it does it will consider the recommendation to include Venice in the list of Endangered World Heritage Sites, potentially resolving a threat from the word body that has been open now for seven years. It is equally well-known that during those years the many problems facing Venice have reached crisis proportions. In fact, the situation has gotten bad enough, and the lack of action on the part of the local administration acute enough, that a popular petition has arisen around an open letter to UNESCO Director General Audrey Azoulay that catalogues the many metastasizing problems in Venice and invites her to come see the situation in Venice in person. Venetians now want UNESCO to put Venice on the “blacklist”, in the desperate hope that it will force someone to pay attention and save the residents that make Venice a city, not a theme park.
The petition is available to sign here: https://www.change.org/p/salviamo-venezia-ed-i-suoi-abitanti.
The text of the letter follows below.
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To: UNESCO Director General Audrey Azoulay
The Venice that so many travelers, books and films have told of and made the whole world love is disappearing.
Make sure that you can still get lost in Venice and above all that some locals can still show you the right way.
Today the city is increasingly burdened by masses of tourists that crowd the alleys, the bridges and public transportation, putting people’s safety at risk.
The tourism monoculture is overwhelming the local stores and the few business and artisan activities that keep the city’s fabric alive, now reduced to fewer than 50,000 inhabitants.
Meanwhile, new hotels, new tourist souvenir shops, new take-out bars, and new concessions for outdoor restaurant and bar seating continue to open.
Every year a thousand residents leave the lagoon city.
The stress on public transportation no longer guarantees normal movement for those who live in this city.
There are not sufficient services to keep the city clean from the enormous masses of garbage that the tourists generate.
There is still no regulation of the short-term tourist rentals that are eroding the entire residential fabric of the city.
Nothing has been done towards management of the flow of tourists.
There is no regulation that controls navigation of the canals: moto ondoso is physically breaking down the city and putting people’s lives at risk.
Sustainability is a word that is used to cover all types of speculation: the so-called Bosco dello Sport demonstrates this, and Europe discovered and condemned it.
The majority of the public housing stock remains unassigned and empty.
The quality of life is adversely affected, and decline, petty crime and the fear of going out at night are growing.
All of this is generated by a tourism machine launched without control to quickly obtain large profits for a few, against the common good and against the people who want to live in the city.
Because the greatest heritage that we are asking you to save is the inhabitants. They are the ones who in every sense allow Venice to be called a city.
Dear Audrey Azoulay, please come lose yourself in Venice to see the real situation of the city in person.
Campaign For A Living Venice 