Venezia : casa, spopolamento e dinamiche turistiche

This contribution provides an insight into the main residential issues which are affecting Venice historic city centre. While dynamics of depopulation and age- ing – somehow connected to the poor conditions (and high costs) of the building stock – trace back to the Fifties and Sixties of the XX Century, it is evident that the same are currently intertwined with the massive processes of touristicisation affecting the city. These are basically reducing the supply of housing units on market, and pushing the costs of living further up: as a result, Venice turns out to be a gentrifying, unafforda- ble and expelling urban area, increasingly overcrowded by flows of international visitors and led by the tourist market’s needs. Conflicts and protests also confirm the dissatisfaction that the population of Venice is experi- encing. Within this framework, the practices of occupa- tion of vacant public residential buildings carried out by collective movements, suggest an alternative idea of living in Venice: we claim that they might bring sig- nificant insights for future inclusive housing policies, aimed at balancing the residents’ needs with those of tourists in a more sustainable way.