Italy is bracing for a record wave of tourists, but is having trouble handling them

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Tourists line a street in Venice, Italy, on Saturday, March 16, 2024. Venice collected €37 million in overnight tourist taxes in 2023, with hotels charging guests anywhere between €1 and €5.  Nathan Laine | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Bellagio, Lake Como, Italy — When boat drivers start complaining about the tourists overrunning this famous lakeside resort, where Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce stayed at the Villa Sola Cabiati in Tremezzo two weeks ago after her series of Paris concerts, you know you have a problem. 

“There are days when traffic comes to a stop, you cannot move,” our driver told us. He makes his living driving tourists up and down the lake for the famous views of the mountains and the 19th-century villas like Villa del Balbianello, where parts of “Casino Royale” and “Star Wars: Episode II” were filmed. 

He considers himself fortunate he’s a boat driver: he pities the poor tourists who rent cars or try to find an elusive taxi. 

“Some days it can take an hour to go 10 kilometers [about 6 miles],” he said, noting that the tiny two-lane roads not only can’t handle the traffic, they can’t handle the larger cars that are being built. “Many towns can only have traffic go in one direction, so everyone has to wait,” he said. 

Can’t live with them, can’t live without them

Italy is caught in an envious trap: it can’t live without tourists, but it’s having trouble handling the influx, particularly after Covid. Sixty million tourists flooded the country last year, pumping an enormous amount of money into the economy. Travel and tourism accounted for 10.2% of Italy’s GDP in 2022, according to Statista.  The sector employs approximately 4.4 million people, about 16% of total employment. 

A general picture shows the main facade of the Pantheon in Piazza della Rotonda on March 30, 2024 in Rome, Italy. Emanuele Cremaschi | Getty Images

The problem of “too many tourists” may seem like a problem a country wants to have, but in recent years the crush of visitors has gotten so bad that Italian authorities have had to take measures to avoid damage to centuries old structures that cannot handle the crush of so many visitors. Venice has been charging 5 euros to enter the city for day travelers not staying overnight, for example. 

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