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CNN Travel Now Insights:

Restoring and exploring Venice


In this story:

The Save Venice campaign

Gallery: Venetian restoration projects

Venicescapes: Tours off the beaten path

RELATED STORIES, SITES icon



VENICE, Italy (CNN) -- Venice is at a crossroads.

The city is one of Italy's cultural jewels, a place of gondolas and artwork, canals and palaces. It's also a victim of its own appeal as Venice today is struggling to balance a thousand years of history with millions of tourists.

Each year, more than 12 million visitors flock to the waterscape, eager to watch pigeons take flight from Piazza San Marco, gaze at the bronze horses standing in a frozen prance on the balcony of the Basilica San Marco and glide into the Carnivale setting by gondola.

  GALLERY
 

It's not uncommon for tourists to hike up their cuffs as water floods the walkways during the winter time. Some may consider wet feet part of the Venice adventure; others disagree. They think the floods are a harbinger of trouble.

The ground level of Venice has dropped by almost nine inches (23 centimeters) during the last century, according to some reports, which attribute the change both to natural phenomena and industrial work.

Venice is a paradox, too: Its waterways are its lifeblood, and the single greatest threat to the city's artistic treasures.

Nor is sinking the only problem facing Venice. Overwhelming crowds, combined with pollution, erosion and simply the passage of time, have sent a wave of concern washing over the city.

Technology is another culprit.

"Once upon a time, there was not the motorboat," says Paolo Gardin, president of Insula, a company that maintains 30 miles (48 kilometers) of canal. "In the last 30 to 40 years, the problems induced by the motorboat -- the waves -- make a big problem to the banks. So we have to repair the banks much more often than in the past."

But the motorboats that damage the canals are essential to Venetian life, notes Insula director Ivano Turlon. "This is a fundamental problem," he says. "(It's) a modern city, but also a city that must be conserved for its high historical value and ambiance."

The Save Venice campaign

Save Venice Inc. has taken a lead role in conserving the city's treasures. The nonprofit group says it has raised funds for more than 100 restorations in the past 33 years.

One major project focuses on the Scuola Grande di San Marco, which now serves as the facade of Venice's city hospital. "It's really one of the great treasures of Venetian art," says Beatrice Guthrie, a member of the Save Venice board of directors.

Pointing to some cherub sculptures, Guthrie notes salt damage from briny canal water. The stone is white, which is misleading, she says.

"(Y)ou would think this is where it's clean, (but) is in fact where the most salt damage has occurred," she says.

Venicescapes: Tours off the beaten path

Venicescapes, a nonprofit cultural association created to foster awareness of Venetian history, also has joined preservation efforts. Founder Michael Broderick takes tour groups to hidden treasures beyond Piazza San Marco, highlighting the city's past.

  TOURING VENICE

Venicescapes offers five private "theme" itineraries:


  
 

"People miss out on the tremendous importance that Venice had on the way that our civilization developed," he says.

One of the tours explores the tiny offices and dark corridors where justice was dispensed during the Renaissance -- the famous lions' mouths which could condemn a man to death, the offices of the dreaded Council of Ten and the adjoining torture chamber of the State Inquisition.

Torture chambers? Lions' mouths? Perhaps some of the stops on these tours aren't always what tourists routinely see.

But Venice, its promoters note, is not a routine city -- nor are the challenges facing this old gem battered by the passage of time and tourists.

CNN Travel Now Correspondent Stephanie Oswald and Travel Writer Mary Jo Lipman contributed to this report
RELATED RESOURCES:
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RELATED SITES:
Save Venice
Venicescapes
In Italy Online
U.S. Consular Information Sheet: Italy
CDC Travelers' Health: Western Europe

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