If Paris is the city of love, then Venice is synonymous with beauty. With art and culture in abundance, the floating city has never struggled to enchant its guests, so much so that approximately 20 million tourists flock to Italy’s north-eastern city each year. This number only looks to increase, as the Marco Polo Airport’s owner and operator, SAVE, works to expand the airport to increase capacity to 21 million passengers per annum.
Venice is most popularly known for its beautiful architecture, rich history, unique city landscape with its labyrinthine canals and glistening lagoon. In 1987, “Venice and its Lagoon” was inscribed on the World Heritage List for its rich historical, cultural and architectural heritage.
But earlier this year, Venice made headlines for a different reason, when a stretch of the Grand Canal caught the attention of locals as it appeared to turn fluorescent green. After speculation that it might be a form of protest by environmentalists, local authorities say the green appearance was due to fluorescein – an ecologically harmless substance used to test wastewater networks.
Going green
This was not the first time the Grand Canal turned green. In 1968, the Argentinian artist Nicolás García Uriburu dyed the waters of Venice’s Grand Canal green with the same fluorescent substance during the 34th Venice Biennale in a stunt to raise ecological awareness. For one day, García Uriburu’s transformed the landscape of the city, with its waters fluorescent green until the low tide gradually drained the dye away.
The city is under threat, from erosion, rising sea levels, pollution and overtourism. These fluorescent sightings – whether they are intentional stunts to promote environmental awareness or not – echo the continuous need for greener policies in Venice. The urgency to make environmental preparations is essential, as it braces itself for the looming impacts of climate change, some of which are already presenting considerable challenges for the fragile city. As tourists continue to swarm its busy canals, implementing stringent environmental policy seems more critical than ever, if Venice is to survive.
Venice is sinking
As Venice is spread over more than 100 islands, crisscrossed by 177 canals, which are traversed via the use of its 391 bridges, the threat of the city sinking has been a topic of conversation for decades. Many of the ground floors of the city’s buildings are now uninhabitable, and its canal slides are eroding away from flooding.
With Venice so close to sea level, flooding from the seasonal tidal peaks called the acqua alta has threatened the city since the Middle Ages, records show. But in recent years flooding has become more severe, thought to be a direct result of climate change, according to recent findings. The rising sea waters are damaging Venice’s historical foundations and causing it to erode. The lagoon level has risen by approximately 25cm in the past century and is projected to rise another 30cm by 2050.
In November 2019, Venice faced its second-worst flooding event in nearly a century. The news made headlines globally, showcasing the stunning and distressing images of Saint Mark’s Square, one of the city’s most iconic and low-lying areas, submerged in several feet of water. The water level peaked at 187cm (6.1ft) above sea level, resulting in more than 80% of the city being flooded. The mayor of Venice, Luigi Brugnaro, declared a state of emergency, and the estimated cost of damages was €1bn.
To mitigate these high tides, Venice instigated plans to implement a floodgate system. After several delays, a costly 1.5km wall of dams called MOSE was built in 2020, which successfully held waters back, but as concerns grow around the potential damage to the seabed and local environment, only time will determine the effectiveness of this project against climate risk.
A victim of overtourism
Flooding isn’t the only cause of erosion in this antique city. While Venice avoided a place on the list of endangered heritage sites from Unesco this year, the “city of bridges” has fallen victim to the phenomenon of overtourism; where the excessively high number of tourists is causing negative impacts on the city and those living in it. Once the home to artists and writers, the city has become swamped by holidaymakers with nearly 120,000 visitors a day, considerably outnumbering the 50,000 local residents. Many other cities such as Reykjavik and Dubrovnik have been marked with similar impacts of overtourism, due to factors such as low-cost flights, cruise ships and the proliferation of home-sharing and accommodation platforms such as Airbnb.
The impacts of overtourism, such as pollution and erosion, pose a threat to Venice’s cultural and natural legacy, its economy, and way of life – the very things that contribute to the city’s unique charm. Multiple factors are affecting the quality of water in the Venice lagoon, with rising temperatures and human activity pollution also contributing to algal blooms and other water quality issues.
To address these challenges, the city is taking action to bolster environmental and tourism policies to preserve its vulnerable future. Venice has implemented various new measures that aim to reduce the impacts of climate change and to minimise the negative effects of tourism to protect the city’s structural and environmental needs.
New policies will save Venice
With such a historical city so vulnerable to its surrounding waters, the city saw a ban on cruise ships over 25,000 GRT (gross tonnage) to protect its waterways, forcing them to visit alternative nearby ports. These national waterways are crowned a national monument for Italy, and they will only become increasingly vulnerable to erosion with the oncoming impacts of climate change. This also follows the need to reduce pollution, with the city limiting the use of motorboats and reducing emissions from ships in the lagoon.
Last year, the city also announced that it would implement a tourist tax of €5 per day that will come into effect in 2025, with a trial period beginning as early as next year. This will require travellers to present pre-paid tickets before entering the city at busy times. The purpose of this new initiative is to minimise the effects of overcrowding and encourage tourists to visit less vulnerable areas.
Sustainability capital of the world
On 17 February 2022, the Venice City Council voted in favour of creating the ‘Venice World Capital of Sustainability‘ foundation. This organisation will lead several projects aimed at promoting sustainable growth by implementing energy transition and renewable energy production, including a hydrogen hub. The foundation will also seek to revamp the city as an international education centre, focusing on urban renewal and sustainable tourism.
Additionally, there will be interventions for social inclusion and support, with tax relief for residents and plans to support local businesses. Mayor Brugnaro presented the initiative at the Italian Pavilion during Expo 2020 in Dubai and hopes to attract public and private investments totalling between €3bn and €4bn euros.
Without these critical measures to manage tourism, pollution and erosion, Venice’s urban fabric will be endangered. Being the only city of its kind on the planet and a Unesco World Heritage Site, this city possesses exceptional cultural and natural value that demands its preservation. Development and innovation of new technologies, sustainable investment and more stringent green initiatives will help to protect the city’s future for generations to come.
[Read more: Venice had its own ‘Airbnb problem’ during the Renaissance. Here’s how it solved it.]
