In Venice, it's boiling, towering above the city are giant cruise ships

Venice - The scene at one moment resembles everything you would expect from Venice: medieval churches, temples, and bell towers, water shimmering in the canal before you. However, this image can quite suddenly and dramatically change. An enormous, gleaming white cruise ship intrudes into the view. As this ultra-modern floating resort sails through the canal, it completely dominates the scene and towers over the ancient city. And somewhere high above the railing, some of the thousands of its passengers look down at the palaces and piazzas, wrote the BBC news site.



In the middle of the tourist season, these giants of the sea emerge one after the other. In a single day, they can bring up to 30,000 visitors to the city. Some residents of Venice are bitterly protesting against this, and their campaign against large ships has gained momentum over the past few months. In April, they held a protest event where they sailed around one of these large vessels in small boats, honking horns and whistles.
"You're too big!" yelled one activist to the ship through a megaphone.
The giant vessels are, for these activists, a symbol of an industry that is flooding their hometown. The disagreements over cruise ships touch on the heart of the dispute regarding what Venice should sacrifice for the sake of tourism.
"I hate this cruise ship business," says Silvio Testa, spokesman for the protest campaign. "It’s the most visible expression of the vulgar exploitation of my city. There’s no doubt about the beauty of Venice. But the city pays for it like a beautiful prostitute." A spokesperson for the Venice office of the heritage protection organization Italia Nostra supports this view. "It’s as if Venice were private property that must be exploited for most people," she said.
Objections to the ships have aesthetic reasons; activists see them as intruders from the modern world who regularly destroy the historical atmosphere of the city. Testa points out that the ships not only bring too many tourists but that the waves they create could damage the buildings along the canals.
However, Roberto Perocchio, the director of the port where these ships dock, rejects all of this. He points out that it only takes a few minutes for any vessel to pass by any location in the city. Any impact on the famous Venetian sights is only temporary. As for air pollution, ships comply with European Union regulations, according to Perocchio. Moreover, there are plans to further reduce emissions. Perocchio insists that the ships do not damage the foundations of the Venetian villas.
"Since 2003 and 2004, everything has been carefully monitored to ensure that the movement of water, a very slow and gentle movement caused by a passing ship, will have the same force in the Venetian lagoon as a natural tide," he said.
The tourism industry claims that passengers on these ships leave 20 percent of the total revenue that the city receives from its 20 million visitors each year. Each ship reportedly pays 150,000 euros (more than 3.6 million crowns) for port services every time it docks.
"The city went through very hard times in the early 50s and 60s, and I would say that most Venetians are proud of this economy," he said. According to him, heritage protectors risk paralyzing the city by locking it in the past.
And while this dispute continues, the ships are still making their way into the city, and passengers from them are joining the crowds of tourists who walk through the alleys, creating clusters in the large and busy St. Mark's Square.
But it is possible that a change may occur. The environmental committee of the Italian parliament is considering legislation that would give the city greater control over the management of its waters. It is still unclear what exactly this would mean. At one point, however, it could lead to larger ships being barred from the canals that they can currently navigate through the city. Among a number of long-term plans are proposals for facilities that would allow cruise ships to dock not directly in Venice but somewhere nearby.