How urban guerillas are tackling the canal city’s housing crisis, one home at a time
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Venetian: On the Grand Canal, I watch dozens of dazzling people arrive in flashy motorboats for a party at one of the palaces near the Rialto Bridge.
The Venice Biennale is about to begin and events are going on all over the city for serious followers of contemporary art. But I’m looking for a group of urban guerrillas.
Across the canal from the party, I find Federica Toninello and her friends in an empty space at the Rialto fish market; Here they are setting up microphones and speakers for a meeting about the housing shortage. It is 6pm and the market stalls are empty; In their place are rows of seats for residents worried about their city.
“We know that the economy of the city depends on tourism,” Toninello told me before the crowds arrived. “The problem is that tourism is the only economy of this city.”
He has lived in Venice for almost 12 years and is struggling to pay for a place of his own. So he and others are searching for ruined buildings that have been locked by the local government. And they come in.
“One of the problems is social housing,” he says. “There are approximately 1,000 closed houses on the island alone. Since these are behind a gate, they cannot be entered and they are not allocated to people. The reason of the authorities is that they do not have money to restore and maintain the houses.”
That’s why Toninello is a member. Assemblea Sociale per la Casaor ASC, group meeting at the fish market. It is thought that some abandoned houses have been closed for 30-40 years. Its members are moving and renovating in the hopes that they can live rent-free, at least for a while.
The idea of empty houses in Venice seems extremely strange. I arrived at this meeting after taking the Line 1 vaporetto (public water bus) down the Grand Canal near crowded St. Mark’s Square. Visitors spend so much money here that you’d expect every spare room to be occupied and the larger closets to come with fold-out beds.
But the numbers tell the story. The city’s population fell from 175,000 in the 1930s to less than 50,000 today. According to global data platform Statista. As people leave or die, buildings in quieter areas, including public housing, remain vacant. Not every house is a palace on the canal.
Meanwhile, tourists continue to arrive. At least 5.9 million remain by 2024, according to the City of Venice Tourism Department. The influx has doubled since the turn of the century, and that number undercounts the crowds because it does not include day visitors arriving by car, bus, train or cruise ship. The most important exhibit in the debate over overtourism is Venice.
The noble decay of a quiet Venetian street may look wonderful on a postcard, but it can also be a sign of empty housing in a city that is losing its people.
“We go into homes that are closed and cannot be allocated to people because they need too much renovation,” says Toninello. “We’re adding, we’re restoring. It’s a very grassroots operation. But it’s not easy to live that way because you never know what’s going to happen. There’s a lot of criminalization of the people who occupy it, but they have no choice because the pubs are kept closed and the rents in the private market are so high.”
Despite the pressures of tourism, the local community still exists. Sitting in a café in the Giardini district one morning, I listened to Italian women greeting their neighbors as they walked their dogs on the sidewalk. Their voices were like music. I couldn’t help but wonder about the sad future of Venice, where people go and the only customers in the cafe are tourists.
Today Venice survives only thanks to its large and growing temporary workforce. While queuing at the Rialto pier at 11:30 one night, I watched migrant workers fill the Line 1 vaporetto to the point of standing. They were mostly men in their twenties, from the Indian subcontinent, who finished their days in restaurants and checked their phones without even looking at the view. They get off at Piazzale Roma, where you can transfer by car or bus to towns outside the lagoon. This is the life of a cook or a waiter: workers cannot afford to live in the city they support.
Local people are worried that Venice will turn into a kind of Disneyland. It may be a bit like this in San Marco Square, which is full of tour groups, but the square has nothing to do with shops. The Basilica and the Doge’s Palace are magnificent homes of history and art, and no one should want a world where they cannot be seen. Since I couldn’t afford a coffee the last time I visited the square in 1996, I was determined to have one this time. I stopped at Caffe Lavena and listened to a piano quartet playing Italian classics. Espresso was €12 – about $19. I didn’t regret it.
Last year’s big event, the wedding of Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sánchez in Venice, highlighted the extreme wealth of its distinguished visitors; Toninello was also one of those who objected to the exhibition. The city has an impressive way of separating visitors from their money, but the cost is a way of limiting the number of tourists. It’s hard to see how it’s possible to work any other way. The “Venice Access Fee” for tourists is currently 5 Euros, but that is barely as much as a sip of coffee. It is inevitable that it will rise.
Everywhere you look the views are spectacular. However, the future of tourism in Venice is not a pretty sight.
We all know that traveling is a troublesome business: We change the places we love because we love them so much. What is noticeable about Venice is that the community shrinks as the tourist trade expands. So, who will take precautions against overtourism? The best mechanism is an active voting public that can push out leaders who care more about tourist money than local services. What if voters have to leave? As more people are moved out of the city, the danger of Disneyland looms.
Although visitors enjoy Venice, it is difficult to know what they should do to preserve it. So I ask Toninello.
“Try to look for more local things,” he says. For example, spend money at local stores. One concern is that essential services such as pharmacies may close because they are priced out by stores or large chains that sell to tourists. This is how neighborhoods lose their comfort and character.
“Also try to stay in the city and act like you are in the city,” he adds.
It’s about respecting the place, slowing down, and not making things difficult for those who live there. After all, it is the local people who make Venice a living city. This is a lesson for world tourism.
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David Crowe is the European correspondent for The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age.Connect with: X or email.
