Venice: HQ Pictures from the City in Water
Venice is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Europe. The city is famous for its canals, rich history, beautiful architecture, and of course for the renowned Carnival of Venice. (Click pictures for an HQ 1024×768 version).
Every year more than 14 million tourists come to Venice, twice as much as to Rome, which makes it one of the most visited cities in the world. (To compare: Mallorca sees about 13 million people a year and France – 70). It’s not surprising that Venice has the most expensive accommodation in Italy. B&Bs can cost as much as 200 Euro a night. Ripping-off tourists is a common practice in Venice: for a cup of cappuccino you will pay up to 12 Euro and a gondola-trip will cost you 75 Euro (one can fly to, say, Berlin and back for less).
The immense amount of tourists made the city administration take some unusual measures. Now there are posters warning of Venice and not recommending visiting it. Posters feature disgusting pictures of rats, rotting canals and palaces in decay – the unpleasant parts of Venice. The reason is that the majority of tourists are useless to the city’s economy. Most people come to Venice for a day or two. They bring their own food, make some pictures and leave. They litter the streets, produce crowd and noise without spending much money.
City Structure
Venice is a city in water. It rests on millions of oak- elm- and larch piles dug into the sandy and uliginose bottom of the lagoon. The builders of Venice had discovered the clayey ground under the thick silt layer which could support heavy stone buildings if enough piles were driven into it. Building the city required lots of trunks supplied from the neighboring Istria. For example, there are 12000 piles below the Rialto Bridge, the foundation of St. Marc’s Campanile has 100,000 and the church of Santa Maria della Salute rests upon 1.1 million piles.
Today many Venetian palaces and churches are in a state of decay. The reason to that is the constantly rising water level in Venice. In some buildings the lower floors are no longer habitable. Since the end of the republic of Venice centuries ago the proper maintenance of building and canals has been neglected. The deepening of canals and the lagoon to make them accessible for larger vessels had the negative effect on the buildings’ foundations as well. All these make Venice not the best city to live in, and about 30% of houses are abandoned.
Venice: Buildings in Decay:
Canals of Venice
There are 175 canals in Venice with a total length of 38 km (about 23 miles). For hundreds years they have been used to transport goods and people around the city. Most of the Venice’s canals still serve this purpose. Waterbuses (vaporetti) were introduces as public transit in 19th century.
The water level in canals is not constant. As any coastal city Venice sees low and high tides. The level difference can reach 60 cm (23”). The city employs a complex system to ensure a constant circulation of water, but nonetheless in some canals water is mostly still.
The canals were initially dug 1.85 m (6 feet) deep, but the bottom was not cleaned since the times of doges (18th century). This is the cause of a repulsive stench, especially when the tide is low. It gets even worse when the ancient sewers are blocked. To prevent the household waste building up in silt, many houses are supplied with sewage filters, which, however, alone are not the solution to this problem.
Bridges are another important part of Venice communication system. The oldest were built of wood, later sandstone and bricks were used. But still some canals can’t be crossed by pedestrians.
More Pictures of Venice Canals
Streets and Squares
There are hundreds of small side-streets, alleyways, pens and passages called calli, salizzade, rughe, liste, rami, sottoporteghi, rii terrà and fondamenta, bigger squares and places called campi and campielli. Besides, the city has a strada (Strada Nova) and tree vie (Via 25 aprile, Via Vittorio Emanuele and Via Garibaldi). The proud name of piazza is given only to Piazza di San Marco – the central spot in Venice.
Piazza San Marco
The famous Piazza San Marco is dominated by St Marc’s Basilica (Basilica di San Marco a Venezia), its bell tower St Mark’s Campanile, Doge’s Palace (Palazzo Ducale di Venezia) and St Marc’s Clocktower.
St Marc’s Basilica Pictures:
St. Marc’s Campanille:
Doge’s Palace:
MoreViews of Venice
