Urban development and tourism 1.1 Does tourism matter? When we look at the way in which the agglomeration of Venice developed, the high speed of deconcentration of both population and economic activities — from the historical center to parts of the commune on the mainland and the last decade even to communes in the province, a process also known as suburbanisation — is at least noticeable (see for an English survey of existing literature Van der Borg, 1987).