Author Archives: Living Venice

Venice Transit News: Aerobus & Rialto Landing

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Venice ACTV revises fares, revitalizes buses and adds a convenient combo land-boat entrance fare to the city. 

The ACTV Venice city bus °5 has always traveled between the airport and Piazzale Roma. Although recent changes mean this route is no longer included in the Venice Travel Pass, additional service improvements still make the Aerobus a convenient transfer option. They’ve upgraded the buses, increased their size (it’s a double) and also augmented the number of trips the Aerobuses make daily.

If you have baggage, the standard fare for the #5 Aerobus transfer between Piazzale Roma and the airport is now €5, compared to the normal bus fare of 2,50. More conveniently, you can now buy one €10 ticket that includes the Aerobus and the vaporetto ticket — the only requirement is that you have Marco Polo Airport as departure or arrival point. So:

• €5: one-way Aerobus Venice Marco Polo <-> P.Roma.
• €9: round-trip
• €10 bus+boat: includes land bus transfer and one 90 min. vaporetto ticket (normally 6,50). Tickets are good to or from the airport.
• If you buy the a Travel Card pass, you can add the Aerobus ticket to it for €3.
• If you don’t have baggage you ride for the normal fare.

Remember that Aerobus °5 is no longer included in Venice Travel Card passes (unless you have no luggage); tickets must now be purchased separately, at machines or ticket counters. You may purchase the discount travel card with a one-way or round trip Aerobus ticket in advance purchase at VeniceConnected.com.

You do not need a CartaVenezia iMob pass for this fare. According to the press release, holders can purchase an Aerobus ticket for €3, although the ACTV and ticketing machines specify the €1,20 fare.

Rialto Line 2 boarding separates subscription and non-subscription iMob card holders.

In an attempt to better control the heavy flow of passengers at the Line 2 Rialto vaporetto stop, the ACTV has just announced they will separate boarding for CartaVenezia and non-CartaVenezia ticket holders, in effect daily from 4pm – 8:30 pm during the summer season for boats heading in either direction.

There will be one line for those with a CartaVenezia subscription, and another for those with magnetic paper travel cards. The first line will also accomodate those with mobility issues, wheelchairs, etc.

At other times of the day and the end of the summer season there will be a single boarding area only.

 

Cook like a Ve-ne-tian: Settemari’s “The Venetian Fork”

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“Se i voga come che i magna i riva sempre primi.” If they rowed like they ate, they’d always come in first.

This phrase is off the back cover of the hot-off-the-San Marco Press’s “Forchette Veneziane, A Venetian Cookbook” compiled and produced by members of the Settemari (Seven Seas) rowing club and cultural association. This club has the voga (Venetian rowing) at its heart, but always has a plethora of cultural initiatives in the works, from theatre productions, to Burano lace courses, to the Venetian of the Year award that they created over 30 years ago.

The latest is a charming cookbook, a compilation of recipes from Settemari members, both Venice-born and long-time local foresti da chissà dove, foreigners from who knows where.

This authentic collection, rather than choosing to be in one language or another, is in both (or  more precisely, all three): English on the left side, Italian (or Venetian) on the right. Works perfectly whether you’re attempting to learn one or the other (or the other) of them — or resigned to only one.

The recipes, instead of trying to be necessarily representative or dogmatically Venetian, are instead what people cook nowadays, and have for decades, for themselves and to share — which in Settemari’s case, is quite often. Did you know duck was a big part of Venetian cuisine? (You would if you thought about it for a bit, given that they’ve been quacking about the lagoon since before there was a Venice.) Try the Anatra Ripiena, a Redentore option when duck is a must-serve. Of course capesante, but Antonella M has included “Scallops with Cardoons,” adapted from a meal she ate at “a prestigious restaurant in Torcello” some time back. There’s Cus-cus di Barena, which requires neither cooking nor much space (read: boat). Pasta e fagioli yes, but for a hundred people (post regatta), with the advice that “the colder it is outside, the more people like it.” You find classics like the perfect Risi e Bisi (rice and peas), and others, that to be true to the recipe you may have to move here: “Artichokes and Friend Chicken” call for “60 castraure (first pruned) artichokes from Mazzorbo…

The Venetian Fork is €10, and you can purchase it here in almost any bookstore around town; it’s available now at the San Marco Press UK online sh0p (for US shipping as well), and seems to be available for international shipping from Amazon.co.uk. Shipping from Amazon.com will likely commence once they’re stocked.

Forchette Veneziane – Le ricette “casalinghe” della Settemari
A Venetian Cookbook – Recipes from the “Settemari” Club

San Marco Press
128 pages
ISBN: 978-0956782618

 

A Rower’s Redentore

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It’s a whole different Redentore at water level, in the area designated for row boats only, just in front of the exclusive (and expensive) private party along the fondamenta at the Punta della Dogana.

The moon was full and the weather ideal — more like May than July. Music from decadent disco barges each completing to have its entertainment reign supreme wafted across the water, while we picnicked on a combination of traditional and contemporary dishes in boats decorated with frasche fresche (fresh branches) and multicolored lanterns that grew brighter as the sky darkened. About dessert time, kayakers began to appear like floating firecracking-seeking fireflies, their headlamps flashing as they bobbed about among the mass of anchored craft. Gondole threaded their way among boats of all sizes seeking the ideal spot from which to view the upcoming pyrotechnics (though it’s hard to find a bad one).

These photos are hardly tack-sharp, a difficult thing to attain from atop one floating vessel shooting more of the same — but you’ll get the idea. It was truly a spectacular display (with plenty of red, white and green this year, to commemorate Italy’s 150th anniversary) from sequences of more subtle pah-pah-pah-pah-pop cannon shots that seem to race along the canal’s edge, to a canopies of explosions that seemed to span the entire night sky, campanile to campanile, riva to riva. It went something like this…

Venice Redentore 2011 – Images by Nan McElroy

And for a truly spectacular video perspective, see

[youtube]iYDUqyxf2zc[/youtube]

Out, out, big ships.

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Venetian citizens insist: Get those massive cruise ships out of the Bacino.

Join the Facebook group – download the original document

From the press release, Venice, 11 July

We are a large group of Venice residents and sympathizers from all over the world who are concerned about the fate of Venice.

In recent weeks we have focused our attention on the problem of the negative impact and intensifying traffic of large ships — 610 mega-cruiseships in 2010 — that travel across the unique ecosystem of the Venetian Lagoon and pass just a few metres from Piazza San Marco along a canal that flows through the heart of the precious city.

On 28 April 2011 we sent a letter to the relevant administrations and local authorities, setting out a series of important issues regarding this type of traffic such as air and noise pollution; the hydrodynamic underwater effects that affect buildings especially in proximity to the smaller lateral canals; the opportunity cost to the city of this additional tourism induced pressure in economic, social, environmental and cultural terms. In more than two months, not a single one of the eight institutions that received our letter has replied.

[lv: On the contrary:]

  • The Cultural Minister, Giancarlo Galan, president of the Veneto Region for many years, superficially reduced the serious issues raised as a collection of questionable and subjective claims based on merely aesthetic criteria.
  • While he was the Mayor of Venice, the current President of the Port Authority, Paolo Costa had highlighted the need to re-route cruise traffic further away from the delicate city centre, but has not yet followed through with a commitment since taking on the Port role.
  • The current Mayor, Giorgio Orsoni, has also spoken out against the presence of these big ships in the lagoon on several occasions. But he too has not yet taken a clear stance now that the citizens he represents have asked him to.

Italia Nostra – Venezia* recently launched an appeal to the United Nations (Unesco) regarding the poor management of Venice. A quick scan of the main foreign websites covering Venice also reveals the high level of concern overshadowing our future.

Yet it doesn’t seem as though this concern is shared with those who – above all – should make the destiny of the city and its residents their priority.

We created a Facebook group to collect followers, ideas, suggestions and open a broad debate on this subject in order to inform thinking about a more sustainable future for Venice and the Lagoon. This spontaneous initiative is underwritten by a varied and representative range of political parties, residents associations, pressure groups, local businesses, celebrities as well as single individuals with a shared focus.

We demand some attention: we have concrete proposals that would safeguard tourism and commercial interests as well as guaranteeing an acceptable quality of life for the Venetians, and without compromising the heritage of the city given the environmental impacts and risk factors associated with the passage of the ships through its heart.

We ask for clear responses to these proposals and a clear stance by the relevant public authorities and administrations. There is no time left for just words. If no response is forthcoming, we will not hesitate in going further to confront the city’s administrators and those responsible for deciding port activities in other contexts such as the international organisations overseeing issues like public health, environmental protection, art, culture and heritage preservation, and are best positioned to provide a balanced and objective evaluation of the state of the city and future trends.

The whole world should be exposed to what is happening in Venice.

There is an urgent need to clarify who is responsible for damaging it, who is not, and who is keeping the silence. Venetians want to know.

New members and suggestions are welcome on the Facebook page:

facebook group: Fuori Maxinavi del Bacino San Marco or  tiny.cc/outoutbigships

_____________________

Venetians  want to know — along with a lot of other folks. Not sure what they’ll be able to do however, as they’ve just opened a new passenger terminal at Port Isonzo, and Paolo Costa has come up with a  grand solution of a one-way passage, “like New York,” that of course would involved digging a whole new canal from the Marittima to Fusina.

If you’re unfamiliar with the situation of the ships in Venice, watch the montage:

[youtube]kogUJvLxKGs[/youtube]

* remember you can translate (kinda) any page instantly using the Google Chrome browser, or going to translate.google.com and copy/pasting text.