The water canals in Venice, are being stripped of one of its most famous attractions: the serenading gondola ride experience. Newly issued water traffic regulations in Venice are not allowing for gondolas to group around in the canals.
They must now instead travel in single on the left-hand side of the canals, along with motorized vessels traveling on the right-hand side and ‘overtaking to the left’, these being the orders from a commissioner prefect.
It was also stated that a new process for the renewal of the entire canal system in Venice has begun. This has become a high priority and a long time waiting, ever since the accident from August 2013, where a German tourist was crushed to death in a collision between a public vaporetto and a gondola. Unfortunately, the trial had been postponed for procedural reasons immediately a few days after the accident.
Top priority for the ‘Grand Canal’, the name by which Venetians call the main waterway of the city, is now also geared towards public transportation in and out the small canals and bridges. Under the new specific regulations, there are certain scheduled times for vessels to pass, limited traffic zones, and ‘blue’ routes to avoid traffic jams, especially for private vehicles, taxis and boats carrying goods.
A gondolier himself, Aldo Reato gives no comment to the new rules and regulations for gondolas, but instead says: “I’m waiting to read the text [of the actual law],” and states that being a left-sided rower will create considerable problems, not just for him but for other left-sided rowers too. Being that there are more gondoliers who hold the oar on that particular side, Reato claims that these will be the people who have “obligation to resolve [these issues].”
This new set of rules is the result of a series of meetings initiated by former Mayor of Venice, Giorgio Orsoni. It is the beginning of new changes: the iconic image of gondolas side by side, with tourists on board listening to serenades all together, might just become the image of a postcard– and only that.
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