Venice: Is It Really Doomed to Sink Beneath the Sea?

Or will it still be standing for Jeff Bezos’s vow renewal ceremony?

Venice is having a bit of a moment. Again. Between the rising tides, the rising tempers of locals, and Jeff Bezos hosting a wedding spectacle fit for a Bond villain’s retirement party, you might be forgiven for thinking the city is more film set than functioning home. One minute, it’s supposedly slipping beneath the sea, and the next, it’s staging billionaires on balconies with fireworks over the Grand Canal like climate change is just a conspiracy invented by soggy Venetians.

I’ve been visiting Venice since I was six, long before it became a recurring backdrop for celebrity events and Instagram reels with “See it before it’s gone” captions. We used to take the sleeper train, my grandmother and I, and stay in a modest family-run hotel on the Rio Marin, where dolce far niente meant watching the canal tide rise and fall from the window whilst avoiding the mid-afternoon heat. I’ve been back more than seven times since, exercising my muscle memory of the city each time, and each time, the city has looked both gloriously eternal and slightly more tired.

When I hear people say ‘Venice is sinking’, I flinch slightly. Is Venice really doomed to become a sort of floating Atlantis for influencers and mega-yachts? Well, as with everything Venetian, from vaporetto schedules to political promises, it’s more complicated than it seems.

Image by Levi van Leeuwen via Unsplash)

“Doesn’t Venice flood all the time?”

Yes. And no.

The flooding in Venice, known as acqua alta (“high water”), isn’t new — it’s been splashing its way into Venetian life since the fifth century. It happens when seasonal high tides meet strong Mediterranean winds (the sirocco, for the poetic among us) and push seawater back into the lagoon. When acqua alta is coming, you’ll hear haunting sirens and see locals briskly assembling wooden walkways like an IKEA speedrun. Venetians, ever pragmatic, have perfected the art of life at water level, with waterproof boots by the door, businesses with mini floodgates, schoolchildren splashing their way to class because to them, it’s a normal Tuesday.

So, climate change in Venice isn’t the sole reason for its sinking foundations. But here’s the catch. While acqua alta is natural, it’s been getting worse. Of the ten highest tides ever recorded in Venice, half have happened in the last two decades. The 2019 flood was the second worst in history, submerging Piazza San Marco under nearly two metres of water. Even for a city that lives half a step ahead of the tide, that’s sobering.

(Image by Egor Gordeev via Unsplash)

So, is the city literally sinking?

Not in the melodramatic, apocalyptic way you might picture, with gondolas drifting past submerged rooftops or pigeons wearing snorkels. But Venice has sunk, slowly and unevenly, thanks to a century’s worth of unfortunate choices.

In the 20th century, groundwater was pumped from beneath the city for industrial use, which compacted the soft sediment it rests on. The result? A drop of about 10 centimetres, which was enough to tip Venice further into the lagoon’s embrace. The pumping stopped in the 1960s, but the damage was already done. These days, the city is still sinking, a bit less than 1mm a year.

Add to that the industrial meddling resulting in sediment disruption from the construction of canals and ports, pollution that leaches into the water table, and waves from massive cruise ships that pound the city’s wooden underpinnings. You begin to see why even Venetians occasionally look skyward and mutter, “Basta.”

What about cruise ships and tourists?

Ah yes, the double-edged sword of admiration. Venice loves to be adored. But these days, it’s overswamped with affection, much of it arriving en masse via cruise liner, selfie-stick in hand, staying just long enough to contribute to erosion before disappearing back into international waters.

For years, locals have protested the impact of these floating skyscrapers that lumber down the Giudecca Canal like misplaced apartment blocks. Venetians have protested their presence, stringing ‘No Grandi Navi’ flags from windows and balconies in neighbourhoods like Castello and Dorsoduro. The protests are more than symbolic. They’re impassioned marches, waterfront blockades, and widespread calls to reclaim the lagoon from the grip of mass tourism. After the infamous 2019 crash (when the MSC Opera ploughed into a dock and injured five), the government enforced the long debated Venice cruise ship ban, prohibiting large cruise ships from the fragile centre. A small victory. But ships still sail nearby, and their wake still rocks the floating city sitting anxiously on wooden platforms.

(Image by Jeremy Bezanger via Unsplash)

Then there’s the tourist traffic on land. Millions of day-trippers squeezing into alleyways, dodging hotel taxes, and wearing down the charm they came to see. Plans to charge an entry fee and limit visitor numbers were delayed several times but finally rolled out in 2024. When I arrived on my last visit, I was greeted by municipal wardens in high-vis vests outside Santa Lucia station, enforcing the new access fee (only for day-trippers) with the efficiency of friendly nightclub bouncers. It’s a controversial move, certainly, but for residents, it’s a lifeline and a small attempt to preserve the delicacy of a city not built for crowds the size of small nations.

Can Venice be saved?

We don’t know. The MOSE Project (yes, like the biblical Moses, parting the sea) has installed massive underwater gates that rise during extreme high tides to block the lagoon from swallowing the city. After decades of delays, corruption scandals, and engineering facepalms, it finally began partial operation in 2020. It worked (kind of) during a major flood in 2021, keeping most of the city dry.

But MOSE isn’t a panacea. It doesn’t address groundwater rise, salt damage to foundations, or erosion from boat traffic. And, it can’t be raised all the time without disrupting the natural tidal rhythms that keep the lagoon alive. Like everything in Venice, it’s a delicate balance of saving the city and harming the ecosystem.

Still, there are small victories. During the 2020 lockdown, when the tourists vanished and the vaporetto slowed, the water in the canals ran startlingly clear. You could see fish again. And while the stories about dolphins were mostly fake news (the dolphins were spotted in Sardinia), the sense of hope was certainly real.

So, what now?

Venice isn’t Atlantis yet, but it's not invincible either. Its fate rests not just on engineering marvels or government policy, but on whether we — the admirers, the travellers, the repeat visitors with childhood memories of the tide rising gently from the window — are willing to love it a little more gently.

Go, by all means. But stay a few nights. Eat locally. Avoid the cruises. Walk off the beaten track. Distribute the weight of the trodden path more equally and wander into Cannaregio or get lost in Castello, where laundry flaps above quiet canals and Venetian dialect sings across balconies.

Sustainable travel in Venice is essential. Venice needs space to breathe. And perhaps, in slowing down, we’ll finally see it not as a sinking relic, but as a living city that’s weathered seventeen centuries and is still standing.

Maybe it’ll manage a few more, if we let it.