Sunday, October 13, 2013

With Venice at Their Feet

Though they appear to be relatively harmless, the World Monuments Fund considers the excessive numbers of the mammals above to pose a serious threat to the well-being of Venice
Last week the World Monuments Fund announced that Venice had made their list of Watch Sites for 2014: one of 67 such culturally-important sites in 41 countries whose survival is threatened by neglect, over-development, political economic or social forces. The non-profit preservation group singled out the rapid increase of ever-larger cruise ships over recent years as a primary danger to both the city's infrastructure and its social and cultural fabric (http://www.wmf.org/project/venice).

Venice's inclusion on the list is no surprise, considering that in February of 2013 Ana Somers Cocks, former president of Venice in Peril and a vocal critic of the way in which Venice is being (mis)managed, delivered the Fund's annual Paul Mellon Lecture in New York City. You can view the entire lecture here: http://www.wmf.org/video/2013-paul-mellon-lecture-can-venice-be-saved

It's a talk worth watching for anyone interested in Venice, and it appears to be the forerunner of her more extensive essay entitled "The Coming Death of Venice?" published in the June 20, 2103 issue of The New York Review of Books (http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2013/jun/20/coming-death-venice/?pagination=false).


In both the essay and speech Somers Cocks lays out the major players involved in determining the fate of Venice, explains why the powerful Venice Port Authority and the consortium of private industrial companies called the Consorzio Venezia Nuova wield disproportionate influence, and marvels at the fact that when the Venice City Council finally managed to produce in 2012 the management plan required by the city's designation by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site way back in 1987(!) the plan essentially neglected to seriously address the 3 major threats to the city: (1) the excessive and destructive number of tourists in the city, (2) the excessive and destructive number of big ships, and (3) the global rise in sea levels for which the 5 billion euro water gates being built by the Consorzio Venezia Nuovo will serve as but a temporary stop-gap measure.

In other words, contrary to the old saying "Better late then never," the management plan finally produced by the Venice City Council is so gutless, toothless, and willfully-short-sighted (when not just fecklessly blind) that "late" in their case is really in no way better than "never."

What Ana Somers Cocks has basically been saying in every forum available to her over the last year--including, most recently, in late September at a ceremony here in which she received a prize from the Istituto Veneto per Venezia--is that the ancient world-famous city of Venice, whose history is filled with almost incomprehensibly-extensive engineering projects necessitated by self-preservation, not only has no legitimate viable plan presently in place to assure its own survival, but no apparent plans to come up with one. Unless, Dear Reader, you've drunk so much of the Kool-aid of neo-liberalism that you believe that allowing private interests to squeeze every last drop of profit from the city before its utter collapse qualifies as one.

In her speech to the World Monuments Fund, Somers Cocks quotes a senior member of the Italian government in Rome who tells her simply, "Italians don't like to plan." This is an easy cynical re-affirmation of an old cultural clichè, but having no plan, or intentionally creating gridlock (as has been evident in both the US and Italy) that prevents any plan from being drafted or implemented, is a ham-handedly effective way of maintaining a status quo in which large private interests steer the course.

The surprising thing about all this, though, is that when it comes to cruise ships even the Secretary General for Europe of the international association of cruise lines (CLIA) acknowledges the unsustainability of the way cruise ships now enter and leave Venice. Robert Ashdown is quoted in The Telegraph as saying "We have recognized the need to move away from current navigational routes for some time but there were no alternatives in place" (http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/cruises/cruise-news/10283185/Cruise-lines-seek-Venice-solution.html).

This is more than the Venice City Council was willing to actually put into its planning report!

Not even Hitler could hope to watch the seat of the once great Republic, ruler of a quarter and half-quarter of the Roman Empire, slip past as he sat on a deck chair in his bath robe--but these people could
By this time, of course, Venice's tourist problems are well known, and yet the tourists keep coming. Interestingly enough, the mere (slim) possibility that one eventual day the Basin of San Marco may cease to be a cruise ship highway actually serves to inspire some people to book their room on a cruise ship ASAP.

Few things can make me despair more completely for the future of humanity than reading the Comments section of any online publication, but I was taken by the first one in response to The Telegraph article above, in which a self-described "yachtsman of 50+ years" was so intent on securing for himself "the incredible experience" of "watching Venice slip past from the top deck of a cruise ship" that he booked a cabin as soon as he heard of a possible cruise ship prohibition.

I find this to be a perversely fascinating mindset, and not at all uncommon. The possibility of imminent prohibition, the possibility that your own action may in some small way be contributing to the cultural and/or literal destruction of a 1,000-year-old city--what better recipe for an air of decadent "exclusivity", even though you pass by on a floating Holiday Inn with a Broadway show tune blaring over the ships' speakers to create just the right "ambience."

It was not the way Michelangelo saw the city, nor Dante, Petrarch, Erasmus, Galileo, Mozart, Wagner, Proust, George Eliot nor George Sand. Not even Hitler or Mussolini dreamed during their visits that the seat of the once-awesome Republic might "slip past" thusly, as that valiant "yachtsman of 50+ years" insists upon experiencing the city.

And the fact is, regardless of what the cruise lines might try to sell people, after three years of living here I can assure you, as many of you already know, that there really are better ways to experience the city.



And this is actually one of the smallest cruise ships that enters the lagoon...

15 comments:

  1. Isn't it odd that so few - hardly any - of the people viewing from that ship were holding a camera (or phone-that-takes-photos)? Just a couple of people in the third photo.

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    1. Perhaps, Bert, because I took the pics of the ship when it was almost beyond the Giardini Pubblicci, hence beyond the centro storico and most famously picturesque part of the city (Piazza San Marco)? That's what I'd suspect, but who knows?

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  2. "yachtsman of 50+ years" was so intent on securing for himself "the incredible experience"///

    Some people in their advanced age are preoccupied with their mortality to the extent where all the other considerations just don't matter. He HAS to see Venice slipping past his feet - even if the city drowns the next day.

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    1. David Foster Wallace famously wrote in a review of one of Updike's last novels something like "the narcissist always imagines that the end of the world will coincide with the end of his own life..." But, actually, Sasha, I don't think the yachtsman of 50+ years is alone in his apparent selfishness and disregard. I get the impression that plenty of people of all ages think nothing beyond obtaining their own prized personal experience (even if it comes so packaged as to hardly be "personal" at all). In fact what strikes me is that the current obsession with the end of everything is quite titillating to many--and much more fun than actually sitting down to the hard "dull" work of trying to plan how things might go on.

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    2. I think the situation of being dragged past Venice is ideal for many, being carried from one place to another helps to fight frustration that can ensue from being left in Venice with several hours to fill and feeling queasy. I've seen such visitors at San Marco square, they looked bewildred - they are at the main square of the most beautiful city in the world but they are not feeling good. They've already "put themselves inside a postcard", i.e. made some snapshots of themselves with Venice as the background. But what to do next? There is some time left.

      I've read recently that book, Venice, the Tourist Maze, the authors see feeding pigeons as a simple, intellectually and emotionally undemanding way to interact with Piazza San Marco, with Venice. After this they are ready to return to their ship, the ritual is completed.

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    3. Well there's no accounting for, nor even reason to worry about, what "floats another's boat", but it's unfortunate when people take the trouble to get someplace & then don't enjoy themselves somehow. I

      s that book worth checking out, Sasha?

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    4. I've enjoyed reading the book - it's a mix of history, anecdotes and personal impressions. It has a bibliography like a scientific work but most of the references are to Il Gazzettino. Most of all I've enjoyed the chapter about gondoliers, it's eye-opening, informative, funny and ends with a very amusing experiment when the authors hire a gondola for a native Venetian.

      In case you'd like to browse - or read - it here it is in pdf format, file size 3 Mb:

      http://yadi.sk/d/9b3kROwOBSoX4

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    5. Thanks very much for the link, Sasha, I'll check it out and see if I'd like to buy it. It seems to be only available in book form, which is how I prefer to read things anyway.

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  3. At the conclusion of her essay, Ana Somers Cocks says:

    “The town council concludes its management plan by saying that it will now take part in coordinating all the bodies that have a role or interest in the governance of Venice and its lagoon (see below for the principal players). At least it recognizes that this is the essence of the Venice problem; there are far too many organizations, some state, some local, some left-wing, some right-wing, and all with conflicting priorities. An overarching body, with real power, is what is desperately needed. But this document’s feeble analysis of the city’s problems, its capacity to ignore reality, and its obvious servility in the face of interest groups show that Mayor Orsoni and his council will never be that body.”

    This seems to say it all.

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    1. I think Somers Cocks, and many others, are challenging the town council and Orsoni to prove them wrong. And trying to force their hands when that challenge is not enough. But, predictably, Orsoni simply responds in the exchange of letters that follows the essay with the easy reply that busy-body "outsiders" like Somers Cocks simply don't understand how Venice and Italy works. Of course, this is not a valid reply to the many Venetians and Italians who are also disgusted with him and the town council.

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  4. I heard this story on the news last week, and I appreciate your (and your followers) great insights and ideas presented here.

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    1. Thanks, seductivevenice--and I was glad to learn about your website!

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  5. Without any doubt, e must do anything possible to preserve this marvelous city. And this measure it's necessary, we must do it.

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