Museum, ancient site incomes rising

İZMİR - Anatolia News Agency

İzmir’s world-known ancient city of Ephesus brought the largest income last year. AA photo

The income earned from museums and ancient sites around İzmir in 2011 increased by 41.64 percent over 2010, according to İzmir Culture and Tourism Directorate data.

Earned income was 12.28 million Turkish Liras in 2011. The figure was 8.67 million liras in 2010, according to the data. It shows that 2,792,053 people visited museums and ancient sites around İzmir last year, while 484,943 visited those places free of charge and 414,799 people visited with a Müzekart, a discounted museum card.

The largest income in 2011 came from the ancient city of Ephesus. The income from this ancient site was over 8 million liras, data showed. The number of visitors increased by 12.9 percent compared to the previous year, and 2,082,834 people visited the ancient city.

Ephesus was followed by Yamaç Evleri in the district of Selçuk, with earnings of 1.26 million liras and the Acropolis in Bergama with 1.05 million liras, according to the data.