Over the last ten years, Florence has availed itself of an unstoppable growth in tourism: In the year 2019 tourist presences in the city reached 22 million, as claimed by the CTS (Center for the Study of Tourism of Florence) most of them flocking to the city centre. Hotels always booked, restaurants full of customers, endless queues for the museums, tourists streaming through the narrow streets of the city. From €22 million in 2014 the city grossed nearly €50 million in 2018, from the city tax alone. With this amount, together with revenues from other sources (bus, hotel, museum tickets and restaurants) the city had an income of nearly € 3.4 billion, in the year 2018. Airbnb and apartment rental agencies have taken the place of the locals who have moved out to the outskirts of the city, due to the increasingly high price of apartments. Many historical shops have closed to make way for famous fashion shops and restaurants putting Florence on a par with other European cities. In order to face the increasing demand of tourists, over the years the historic city centre has been completely changed, losing its identity and making life for the few locals that have remained so unbearable that they have started to refer to their city as “Disneyland”. This is what was happening until the arrival of Coronavirus, when, suddenly, all income stopped. For a city like Florence, which for more than a decade has based the greater part of its income exclusively on tourism, the spread of Coronavirus was a dramatic event with many companies and shops forced to close. After two years of Covid restrictions, the situation has returned to “normality” – mass tourism is back, stronger than before. Over the past two years, local authorities haven’t been able to take advantage of the situation that the pandemic had offered, and have started re-evaluating their activities in tourism. In few words they have overlooked the need for a tourism system that embraces new perspectives for better organization, developing a more structured, slower and better quality tourism and re-thinking the way in which what the city offers is being consumed. An offer to tourists that is able to promote the artistic and cultural heritage with activities that create greater awareness and avoid mindless mass exploitation by visitors.
Florence, Italy, October 31st 2022. A Chinese tourist reflected on her phone screen intent on taking a picture of the “Fontana del Nettuno” (Neptune’s Fountain) by the Renaissance artist Bartolomeo Ammanati, one of the main artistic attractions of the cityFlorence, Italy, October 31st 2022. View of an overcrowded Piazza del Duomo, one of the main tourist attractions of the city due to the presence of the Santa Maria del Fiore Cathedral and the Battistero of St. Giovanni.Florence, Italy, October 31st 2022. A tourist shopping at stands in Piazza della Signoria.Florence, Italy September 17th 2022. A tourist intent on taking a picture in Piazza della Signoria.OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAOLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAFlorence, Italy, October 14th 2022. A tourist guide showing a group of tourists the “Porte del Paradiso” of the Battistero of St. Giovanni, by the Renaissance artist Lorenzo Ghiberti. The door is the main entrance of the Battistero di St. Giovanni located in Piazza del Duomo in front of the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore. The original door is preserved in the Museo dell’ Opera del Duomo in Florence.Florence, Italy, October 25th 2022. Tourists seated on the steps of the “Loggia dei Lanzi” in Piazza della Signoria, one of the main tourist attractions of the city. The Loggia dei Lanzi is a building on a corner of the Piazza della Signoria, adjoining the Uffizi Gallery. It consists of wide arches open to the street. It is effectively an open-air sculpture gallery of antique and Renaissance art by some of the greatest artists of that time like Giambologna, Benvenuto Cellini and others.Florence, Italy, October 23rd 2022. A young warden monitoring the main entrance to the “Loggia dei Lanzi” in Piazza della Signoria, one of the main tourist attractions of the city.The Loggia dei Lanzi is a building on a corner of the Piazza della Signoria, adjoining the Uffizi Gallery. It consists of wide arches open to the street. It is effectively an open-air sculpture gallery of antique and Renaissance art by some of the greatest artists of that time like Giambologna, Benvenuto Cellini and others.OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAFlorence, Italy, November 1st 2022. Tourists walking in Piazza della Signoria, in front of the David di Michelangelo reproduction, under maintenance. The original one is preserved in the Galleria dell’Accademia in Florence. Piazza della Signoria is a w-shaped square in front of the Palazzo Vecchio. It is the main point of the origin and history of the Florentine Republic. Today it is the meeting place numerous tourists.OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAFlorence, Italy November 5th 2022. Two children are palying in front of an horse of a “Fiaccheraio”, a typical Florentine horse carriage, that is eating in front of Santa Maria del Fiore Cathedral in Piazza del Duomo (Duom’s square) one of the main tourist attraction of the city. On the background a queue of tourists waiting for get inside the church.OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAOLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAOLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERAFlorence, Italy, November 5th 2022. A tourist leaving Palazzo Vecchio Museum, behind him a poster with a close up of the face of Michelangelo’s David under maintenance. The Palazzo Vecchio is the town hall of Florence, Italy. It overlooks Piazza della Signoria, in which there is a copy of Michelangelo’s statue, and the gallery of statues in the adjacent Loggia dei Lanzi. Palazzo Vecchio is also a museum. Together with Piazza della Signoria it is one of the main tourist attractions of the city.Florence, Italy September 17th 2022. A tourist taking a picture close to Piazza della Repubblica. Piazza della Repubblica was originally the site of the city’s forum; then of its old ghetto, which was swept away during the improvement works initiated during the brief period when Florence was the capital of a reunited Italy (1860-1865). The piazza is today a theatre of street-artists and impromptu exhibitions.
