Italian ghost ports. Whose fault is it? Our investigation

The development of tourist ports is an important building block toward the growth of nautical tourism in Italy. But the system is showing the strain in so many ways: legislative, bureaucratic, administrative. A few port projects that were announced with pomp and circumstance and for a thousand reasons never completed are emblematic of this. And which are there, testifying that change is needed to avoid further failed initiatives and waste and to enhance what (little) has been done. Our investigation

Ghost Ports in Italy

L’economy of Italian ports is growing steadily. According to the latest report by Assomarinas, the association of marinas that is a member of Confindustria Nautica, in 2024 alone, the turnover of permanent berths increased by an average of 2 percent, while transit berths recorded +2.3 percent. Other facilities, from Palermo to Piombino to Pietra Ligure, are being added to the current network of 537 marinas.

But above all, Italy’s coastlines are once again attracting investors who are embarking on expansions, renovations and new projects by taking advantage of national and European funds. For 2025, estimates for the sector are even more positive, driven by favorable numbers from charter and “made in Italy” shipbuilding. That ports and marinas are strategic for supporting and promoting nautical tourism, we at the Journal of Sailing have been saying for years. But today the institutions finally realize it too. Officially sanctioning it was the “Sea Plan” approved by the government in 2023, which recognizes tourist ports and marinas as an “industrial” sector capable of supporting the economic and social development of the country’s tourism and proposes a unified direction. In short, it is a good time for ports and harbors.

Ghost ports, the unrealized projects

Yet many critical points remain for Italian ports: bureaucratic red tape, lack of national coordination, private interests and speculative intentions, not to mention political instrumentalization, construction abuses and failed management.

Emblematic of these unresolved knots are a series of projects announced with pomp and circumstance and never implemented. These are tourist landings and marinas that despite tenders, territorial studies, rivers of money, technical approvals and concessions, remain to all intents and purposes “ghost” ports. With often paradoxical situations that drag on for years bringing only inconvenience to the territory, the economy and the sailing community. Here are some of these “shadow” harbors and their sad history of failure.

Civitavecchia, Kafkaesque case

A prime example of how absurd and exhausting Italian bureaucracy can be when it comes to ports is the case of Civitavecchia. In 2016, five companies submit their plans for the redevelopment of the city port. The awarding of the work must go through the “Conferenza dei Servizi” (Dpr 509/1997), a concessionary procedure activated by the Port Authority.

The first snag is that the perimeter of the focus areas is not defined, leaving everything to the creativity of the proponents. In 2017, therefore, all proposals are sent back and we start again. Of the five investor companies, only three remain, but one of them reports a competitor for anomalies in the procedure. So the municipality freezes everything and waits for the judges’ decision.

Two years pass and the trial ends with the acquittal of the accused. In 2022, the Services Conference decides that the only proposal that meets the requirements of the project is precisely that of the company that was the victim of the criminal complaint that turned out to be unfounded.

Are they starting work? Absolutely not. The Superintendence intervenes because the context of the port is historic and of great architectural value, so another year is lost between evaluations, modifications, and waiting for the go-ahead, which does not come until summer 2023. After seven years, project costs rise from 23 to 32 million. Then in August 2023 comes the cold shower: the Council of State annuls everything finding an “obvious conflict of interest and lack of impartiality that conditioned the procedure.” So? Starting from scratch…

Fiumicino, but what “concord”!

Even more complicated is the realization of the marina in Fiumicino, which has been pending for a good 15 years. On the Latium coast of Isola Sacra, at the mouth of the Tiber River, what was to be the “largest marina in Europe” was announced in 2010.

The Lazio region had issued a 90-year concession to the consortium “Port Initiatives Porto Romano,” and the facility was to be called “Port of Concord.” Berths were also sold in advance to shipowners. Then the same company and its dominus, Francesco Bellavista Caltagirone, ended up under investigation. Work stopped and the shipyards were “frozen.”

With the passage of time, obvious structural criticalities also emerged that would prevent, given the type of seabed, the construction of that type of marina. In 2022, the concession was bought at auction by Royal Caribbean, a U.S.-based multinational corporation among the world’s largest in the cruise industry, which submitted revised plans to build the marina so that it would also become a cruise port.

In January 20222, however, the Antitrust Authority blocked the deal, requiring the municipality to hold a public tender to award the maritime concession related to the port, in compliance with current free market rules. All to go again…

What about Cicero’s Marina?

Also in Lazio, the so-called “Marina di Cicerone” in Formia has been the subject of a long and disastrous bureaucratic and judicial history. The affair originates with the concession signed on March 8, 2010 for an amount of 110 million between the Municipality of Formia and the company “Marina di Cicerone Spa” of the Ranucci Group according to a “Project Financing” for the construction of a marina with more than 600 berths, additional to the existing city port. The size of the project, however, exceeds the urban perimeter of the master plan, and the work requires landscape and environmental permits. However, despite various petitions and reminders, the Municipality of Formia does not send the required documentation causing a long stalemate.

Four executives were investigated for 3.6 million in fiscal damage. The company at that point turned around and withdrew. From 2020 begins a series of back-and-forth over the approval of a new master plan for the port area with expansions and changes of use involving impractical areas, however. In July 2023 it finally comes to an end and work begins on the “Cicero Walk,” an archaeological itinerary that does not, however, involve the port.

Torre del Greco, stopped at the post

We move to Campania, to Torre del Greco, where for years there has been a project to redevelop the harbor, which is in a state of disrepair, with old and unsafe buildings, few berths, dirty and abandoned railroad underpasses, and a long beach that is not swimmable. The goal would also be to revitalize the port, which is strategic for nautical tourism in the Gulf of Naples (we also told you about it in last issue, on page 34). The new project, which is cutting-edge and environmentally sustainable, has all the characteristics to obtain European funds from the PNRR and has been promoted by the City of Torre del Greco as early as 2021. The President of Campania Region, Vincenzo De Luca, himself has publicly supported it.

In fact, there is approval from the City Council and it was officially sent to the region in October 2024. The regional body, however, manages all projects in the Campania region, and there is a queue. Thus, despite multiple attempts, the redevelopment of the port of Torre del Greco for the time being lies on some desk. To date, the final study of the project and the establishment of the tender for the contract are missing. How much longer will we wait?

Marsala, the Ghost Marina

Sicily is no exception. It was supposed to be a work destined to change the face of the city of Marsala, capable of producing an economy, jobs and boosting tourism in a strategic port of call that is located in one of the most evocative points of the Mediterranean, between the Egadi Islands, San Vito lo Capo and the Zingaro Nature Reserve. Instead, after years of futile waiting, there is not even a shadow of Marsala’s new Marina. The project had started in 2016 in implementation of the famous Burlando Decree that incentivized redeveloping port areas through a virtuous network that united municipality and private firms.

The company Marsala Yachting Resort won the tender, and in 2017 the concession was issued. At that point, however, the first problem arises: the port needs to be secured because it is unsuitable for any kind of docking. So? MYR proposes to make an additional investment in securing the harbor by sharing the cost with the municipality. But then the region intervenes, saying “The project is no good, there is too much concrete, and commercial activities that undermine the historic center. We’ll take care of it.”

Instead, everything comes to a standstill and in April 2020, since the work was never started, the region itself revokes the concession to MYR. In the meantime, the port area is increasingly degraded with falling buildings and open dumps. Last November, for the umpteenth time, it was announced by the city council that work would begin with an allocation of 1.2 million euros. A group of companies from Rome is expected to get their hands on it. Among the sailors on the dock, however, skepticism is in the air….

“Marinara-style hot potato.”

Back up the Adriatic. There were the smiling misses holding up the ribbon in the middle of the square, there was the parade of dignitaries in full regalia, and a big cake of colorful fruit. June 22, 2007, saw the opening in Marina di Ravenna of what was to be the largest landfall on the Adriatic with plenty of berths, sea-view apartments, stores and parking. Dreams of a new “Porto Cervo” with piadina and squacquerone cheese, however, remained just that. The company Seaser, a private entity controlled by the Cmr, or Cooperativa muratori riuniti di Filo di Argenta, carried out the work after obtaining a 50-year state concession.

However, the great economic crisis of 2009 arrived, and the same bankruptcy of the parent Coop in 2011 through bankruptcy did not make things any easier. There was also an interlude when management passed through the hands of “Italia Navigando,” an operating arm under the control of the Treasury, but it all ended in a flop. Today the entire stock of Seaser is in the hands of Sorgeva, an agricultural cooperative from Argenta, which, however, in early 2025, after securing the dock, decided to sell the entire compendium for 9 million euros. Who will get this “hot potato”?

Nothing new in Senigallia

The Marche region, too, is not escaping the trickle. Despite being awarded a Blue Flag for tourist landings, the port of Senigallia has boasted serious inefficiencies for years. Punctually funds arrive, the latest in January 2024 of 2.5 million euros, big announcements are made about works, but then everything remains the same.

Along the docks there is a lack of toilets and showers, there are electrical columns that were broken in 2021 and never restored, there is no refueling, the travel lift has been inoperable since 2022, there is a bilge water disposal system that is out of use, and above all, the foreport has never been dredged. A regional grant of 840,000 euros had been inherited from the previous council precisely for the work of dredging the harbor, but it was revoked as the contract was not executed on time. One wonders what criteria are used to assign the flags that fly. The fact is that if there are no services, but only inconveniences and sailors get fed up and go elsewhere, moreover making a very bad word of mouth.

Ospedaletti, where did the port go?

Even in Liguria, new port projects are tempting administrations and individuals. Except that the environmental context is particularly critical. In the wake of the Burlando Decree, the municipality of Ospedaletti, Riviera di Ponente between Sanremo and Bordighera, in 2003 resolved to build the new Baia Verde Marina.

The operation is given to the company Fin.Imm to manage, with direct entrustment by the then mayor Flavio Parrini, who was later arrested for bribes at the end of the year. Against the project, which eats much of the beach, the seabed with Posidonia meadows and public greenery, a civic committee is formed that denounces the whole thing to the Superintendence of Environmental Heritage, as well as to the Tar and the Council of State. Meanwhile, the European Commission declares the area a “Site Of Community Interest,” and in 2006 Legambiente black flags the project. In 2007, work began, but in 2009 it was suspended due to an internal dispute at the contracting station.

Then in 2013 comes a ruling by the Council of State, which in summary notes that the port had no need to be built, violated the landscape, and the very procedure for initiating the work was illegitimate. The attached litigation for damages begins, but ends in 2022 with nothing. Meanwhile, Fin.Imm goes bankrupt.

Then the municipality launches a new tender to award the state concession and works and approves the “Project Financing” of the “New Port of Ospedaletti” company. The project, with an estimated value of 90 million euros, envisages 115 berths, a shipyard with a hauling dock, land storage areas, creation of a beach, gardens, bike paths, parking lots, in short, everything and more. Too bad everything is still on paper, waiting for new studies, additions, permits and so on.

To have no more ghost ports

As we have seen, they are all “cursed” projects scattered across Italy from North to South, started badly and ended worse, indeed never concluded. There are certainly others, evidence of a national system that despite positive numbers is showing the rope on so many aspects.

How to remedy this? First and foremost, a national control room should be created to coordinate the work of regions and local authorities on various fronts: management of territorial areas, allocation of concessions, admissions to funds and tax breaks. In short, making a “system,” as is done in France or Croatia. Then among the general guidelines for the creation of new berths, it would be appropriate to think not only about maxi yachts and luxury boating, but to reserve a greater share of berths for small to medium-sized units. Finally, it would be necessary to establish once and for all a “quality” classification of ports and marinas, as is the case for hotels and tourist facilities, with an effective correspondence between the fees charged and the services offered. Is this so difficult?

The other side of the coin

Italy is full of efficient ports, positioned in strategic locations for tourism and appreciated for their quality of service. From Cala del Forte in Liguria to Marina Cala dei Sardi, from Marina di Cala de’ Medici in Tuscany to Marina d’Arechi in Campania, from Capo d’Orlando Marina in Sicily to the new Shipyard & Marina Sant’Andrea in Friuli, just to name a few.

Virtuous models include the Marinedi network of landings that manages 6,000 berths in 15 facilities and the Turkish group D-Marin that has just landed in Italy. These are groups that go beyond the concept of the local entrepreneur and propose expanded coordinated management that is functional and cutting-edge, in line with the market even abroad. They show that with will and entrepreneurial spirit much can be done….

What is certain is that only a front of welcoming, modern and sustainable ports along our coasts can be a decisive driver not only for “made in Italy” boating, but especially for nautical tourism. What are we waiting for?

David Ingiosi