Italy, the roads of Dante across Tuscany and Romagna
The launch of new trails to travel on foot, bike and by train will mark the 700 anniversary of the Supreme Poet’s death and will boost sustainable tourism and development in local areas. The Metropolitan City of Florence and local municipalities in Tuscany and Romagna are joining forces to launch ‘The Roads of Dante’. “The new tourism offer is dedicated to cultural and natural itineraries inspired by the figure, works and routes travelled by Dante Alighieri across the two regions. In line with our slow tourism approach the initiative is designed for visitors who love trekking, cycling and travelling by train” – says Tommaso Triberti, tourism councillor for the Metropolitan City of Florence and Mayor of Marradi. The project is based on an agreement approved by the Metropolitan City of Florence and progressively joined by other local municipalities like Florence, Ravenna, Forli and Arezzo. The local municipalities will map a network of footpaths and routes and will identify the most suitable travelling options. The initiative is held in preparation for the 700th anniversary of the poet’s death but will also aim at generating new tourism streams, particularly to the internal areas, in the coming years. Supported and coordinated by the Metropolitan City of Florence, leading the other municipalities, the signatories of the agreement will work with the local operators to create tourism products around the new itineraries. These will be travelled on foot or by other means of non-motorised mobility, such as cycling and riding a horse, but could also be partially travelled by transport methods with a lower environmental impact, like the Faentina railway. The 700th Anniversary of Dante’s death, in 2021, represents both a milestone and a starting point for the area as the celebrations will attract extensive media coverage and international interest. To push the project forward is the intuition that while international tourism has been deeply affected by the Covid-19 crisis, slow tourism could now be an interesting trigger for the economic recovery in the short term. Acknowledgements go to the Department of Tourism and Culture for soliciting the coordination between the local municipalities located along Dante’s trails, in the light of the forthcoming commemoration of the 700th anniversary of his death.
