AQUA ALTA’ (Venice) –a danger for the city

Venice has placed itself as a heart in the world of tourism due to its pleasant and relief giving climate. But the city had to face a problem timely that is the occurrence of ‘Aqua-Alta’. This is a typical phenomenon that occurs in the town, in which high tides of salty water may exceed the ground level in some time of the year (generally from October - January). Although it doesn’t affect the life but sometimes may be destructive when takes a wild form. It is a persistent phenomenon throughout the Venice lagoon. The resident here are trying to cope up with the problem over the centuries either by erecting new buildings having impermeable stone foundation in place of the old ones or by raising the entrance level of the buildings. But when the city is flooded by storm driven wind sometimes Venetians simply waited for the water level to be lower down. As the time passed more efforts were made to preserve the historic heritage instead of demolition and making a way for a new structure.
As the 20th century arrived, industrialization in this mercantile republic was encouraged. Thus the climate of the town also shifted. The instances of aqua Alta became more frequent due to the burning of the fossil fuel that raised the global sea level and thus the global warming. In addition to this natural settling of lagoon sediments and the indiscriminate pumping of fresh water from a deep aquifer beneath the city are also the responsible factors for the sinking of Venice over the centuries. These high tides are sometime damaging also, the level of these tides in Venice is continuously rising. If we see towards the foundation of Venice, around sixteen hundred years ago, the level of Adriatic’s standard sea was almost six feet below what it is today. But the level rose as the time fled like in 1900 the extreme high tides of water covered St.Mark's square seven times a year. By 1989 these raised to about 40 times a year, which increased as high as the average tourist’s knee, lapped 99 times at piles in 1996. As peak tides flow over city’s side walk visitors must walk on elevated wooden walk ways as the boats cannot navigate the canals during the highest tides because they cannot pass under bridges. The splashing saltwater from Adriatic Sea soaks into the bricks and creeps into the wall that destroys frescos & other irreplaceable relics.
It was felt that it is essential to bring out some solution to this messy problem of the water of Adriatic that born on twice daily tides. It was thought to line bottom of Venice lagoon’s entrance with hollow steel gate to hold back the sea at time of Aqua Alta. When the weather would become calm, these gates would fill with water. Some of the Italian and International environmentalists, who were following the path of the MOSE solution disapprovingly, criticized this project. According to them this MOSE solution will be obsolete within a few years, looking at the restlessly rising seas. They think that the gates would need to be raise so often which would affect the aquatic life within lagoon. Along with this the sewage that flushed from lagoon will remain behind which will affect living of city for a long period. The critics think that more studies are to be needed on gate’s potential environmental impact, and efforts are required to protect Venice not only for few decades but also for the next century.
The launching of this project faces many of the hurdles in its path such as financing the project. As billions of euros would be needed to launch this project and there has usually been budget crises in the city. It is well known that the Government here is not stable and an administration could come to power that might not support the project. At present engineers are activating an improved system and the Venice’s water treatment has also been improved to encourage the plan. Venetians are installing septic tanks in various areas to dump the sewage that was dumped directly into canals till now. Canals side are rebuilding as waterproof. It is believed that within next two decades, the water treatment facilities would be improved for the safe existence of Venice. It is essential to bring out some fruitful solution to the existing problem for better livelihood