Rome Opens Its Doors to the Night, and the South Watches

Rome is testing a new strategy to manage the crush of summer tourism: opening its museums, parks, archaeological sites, monuments, villas and historic residences at night. The experiment, reported by France 24, is a response to the heatwaves that have made daytime visits punishing and to crowds that saturate the city's most famous landmarks from morning to evening.

The initiative is a quiet revolution in how Italy's most-visited city handles its heritage. For decades the default answer to overtourism has been restriction — bans, tickets, queues. Rome's night openings suggest a different logic: not closing the door, but widening the hours when it stands open.

For Basilicata, the experiment carries a double lesson. Matera, the region's stone city of cave dwellings, knows both sides of the heritage economy — the boom that followed its designation as a European Capital of Culture, and the risk that the crowds become the story. If night visits can spread the load, they might also spread the benefit.