‘Kill Venice’: a systems thinking conceptualisation of urban life, economy, and resilience in tourist cities

Abstract

Mass tourism has been creating increasing complaints and resistances in many tourist cities worldwide. The global Covid-19 health emergency has further affected the complex relationship between the activities of city dwellers and those of the tourist flows. Be the visitors present or abruptly absent, the effects of tourism on housing, labour, and the urban economy as a whole can threaten the very survival of a tourist destination. The ultimate goals of tourist-based transformations are not clear, nor their relationship with the resilience of destinations. A systemic perspective is here offered on tourism in cities, with a focus on the city that likely exhibits the highest level of tourist attraction with respect to its vulnerability, that is, Venice, Italy. Various aspects of its sustainability and resilience, along with the involved interconnection and dependency links, are taken into consideration. Currently proposed alternative scenarios are presented, and their weaknesses commented. Some implications are also addressed for sustainable and resilient transformations. The comprehension of the dynamics that drive a tourist city system, together with the study of its systemic leverage points, appear to be mandatory for effective urban policies and planning.

Whose Health in Whose City? A Systems Thinking Approach to Support and Evaluate Plans, Policies, and Strategies for Lasting Urban Health

“…One of the main features of a ST-based study is the systemic diagram, including processes, stocks, and flows able to describe the operation of a system at a certain level of detail [51,52]; indeed, details exceeding the level of interest can allow for components to be grouped together according to the ST technique of the macroscope [45], thus highlighting their main influences [53]. A system is assigned a boundary, whose meaning is not only physical but also tells external drivers from internal operations-a choice ultimately related to the goal of the study-thus allowing one to define inflows and outflows [38]. Stocks represent the main assets and resources contributing to the operations of a system (here, a city); like flows, they may be expressed-when needed-by extensive variables, and can be either material or immaterial [50].…”

“…Ultimately, collaboration between urban planning and public health is critical for enhancing the capabilities of the built environment to promote well-being and to develop policies aimed at transforming our cities into sustainable, therefore healthier, places [37]. Although, the overall sustainability of a city requires a holistic-systemic perspective that is frequently still lacking when addressing urban policy-making procedures [38]. Based on such preliminary remarks, the purpose of this contribution is to broaden the systemic knowledge of urban systems and health so as to suggest a comprehensive approach rooted in systems thinking to lasting healthy urban planning and urban governance strategies.…”

A Population Game Model for the Expansion of Airbnb in the City of Venice

“…The data for the city of Venice are self-explanatory: the residents registered during the year 2018-2019 in the historic city of Venice were 52,996 in number [28], a loss of 21.5% over the past 20 years [29]. At the same time, over the past 25 years, the number of visitor arrivals has increased 4-fold [30].…”

Multi-Attribute Analysis of Contemporary Cultural Buildings in the Historic Urban Fabric as Sustainable Spaces—Krakow Case Study

“…The areas in question are strongly affected by the phenomenon of gentrification, which was particularly evident in 2020. The decline in tourism during the COVID-19 pandemic demonstrated the lack of resilience in districts that proved to be mono-functional desolate spaces when deprived of foreign visitors [15]. The cultural sector in Krakow is facing a crisis, halting its programme activities and moving from the urban space to the Internet [16].…”