Perhaps, in the whole world, Venice is second only to one city in terms of romance - Paris. Gondoliers, canals instead of streets, fresh sea breeze from the Adriatic - what could be better? But often practical people come up with the question: “How is the sewage system arranged in Venice?” Adding to the confusion are rumors that the city is constantly saturated with the smell of urine and feces. Let's look at both questions.

Typical solutions are not suitable

Venice is a fairly large city by European standards: more than 260 thousand people. Moreover, only a part lives on the continental part, while the rest live on the islands, which made the city so famous. Of course, the sewage system in Venice simply cannot be the same as in other cities in the world.

To lay the pipes, thousands of plumbing divers would have to work for several years, and only if suitable heavy equipment could be found to dig at the bottom of deep channels.

Laying pipes at or above water level is also not possible. In the second case, it would spoil the appearance of the city, of which the Venetians are rightfully proud. And in the first one it would also complicate the movement of water transport.

So there is no way to use typical solutions here. Now let's figure out how the sewer system works in Venice.

Tides are like cleansers

For many centuries, sewerage in this glorious city was simply... absent. Yes, residents had to pour waste directly into the canals. Fortunately, nature itself helped them cope with this complexity. The fact is that the water level changes here four times a day - two high tides and two low tides, like clockwork. Thanks to this, at low tide, the water, along with all the impurities, went into the open sea, and a few hours later it was replaced by fresh sea water, without any impurities.

All sewage was carried into the Venetian Lagoon, which has a very decent size - about 10 kilometers wide and almost 57 kilometers long. Of course, for an area of about 570 square kilometers, several tens of tons of human waste per day do not pose any danger. In addition, this was actively used by many marine inhabitants - the number of microorganisms for which this waste is a nutrient medium has increased significantly. As a result, many marine inhabitants settled here, accustomed to feeding on these microorganisms - from shellfish to small fish, in pursuit of which larger individuals began to swim into the lagoon.

Thus, for many centuries the Venetians killed two birds with one stone - they got rid of sewage, and at the same time fed fish, which fishermen actively caught, providing the townspeople with fresh seafood.

System modernization

Of course, after reading the previous paragraph, many readers will have a question: “How does sewerage work in Venice today?” Are the residents of this beautiful, such a romantic city still living the same way as many centuries ago, getting rid of sewage by simply pouring it into open canals?

You can calm down and not worry. Many years have passed since then, a lot has changed, science and technology have advanced significantly, which makes it possible to completely solve the problem of removing sewage from the city.

So, how do sewers work in Venice today? In fact, it is absent, just like in the years when the city was just being built. The problem was solved in a non-standard way.

Each house had a septic tank installed - approximately the same as those installed in many private cottages. It divides waste into liquid and solid in the same way, passing the former through filters and collecting the latter in a special container. As a result, the relatively purified liquid is discharged into the channels, as before.

But in order to speed up the removal of sewage, three artificial canals were built, providing a much more powerful flow throughout the entire area of the city. The ebb and flow of the tides have become even more intense; there is not a single corner of the city left that is not affected by the current. Solid waste accumulates in septic tanks, and specialists are already dealing with it.

Vacuum boats

If we talk about how the sewer system is made in Venice, we cannot fail to mention the sewer systems. On land, this work is carried out by specialists with trucks. But in a city where there are almost no roads, but there are plenty of canals, this responsibility falls entirely on the boats.

Specially designed vessels, equipped with the latest technology, quickly pump out the sewage accumulated in septic tanks, after which they dispose of them at the appropriate landfills.

Of course, the constant work of specialists in unpleasant conditions, and even equipped with highly specialized equipment, costs the city budget a lot. But it’s still easier than laying a full-fledged sewer system at the bottom of the canals.

The truth about smells

Now that we have figured out what kind of sewage system is in Venice, let's move on to the next question - is there really a stinking cloud constantly hanging over the city?

Fortunately, no. The romantic city smells in winter and summer only of the salty sea. Rumors about the stench are spread by ill-wishers and picked up by people who have never been here.

On the one hand, the amount of sewage is too small. Try pouring a tablespoon of urine into a bucket of water - there will be no smell at all. And in millions of cubic meters of sea water, liquid waste dissolves just as easily.

In addition, a cool breeze almost constantly blows from the sea, which blows the wind away from Venice, bringing freshness and cleanliness to the residents.

So, if you are planning a trip to this glorious city, you definitely don’t need to worry about an unpleasant smell.

Conclusion

This concludes our article. Now you know how the sewer system works in Venice, and you have also read something about its history. We hope that the article expanded your horizons and was interesting!

This post contains everything you wanted, but were afraid to find out about sewerage in beautiful Venice :) Why is St. Mark's Square flooded in the title photo? Yes, because high water and the drainage system in the sinking beauty are directly connected.

Where do you think the contents of antique Venetian chamber pots go? Don’t you think so? :) That’s right - I also didn’t ask myself this question until September 26 of this year.

However, on this fateful day, the entry “And yet she is sinking” (about sinking Venice, if anyone is interested) appeared in my journal. The post unexpectedly received a lot of comments. Among them was this: “Does the author of the post know that in Venice, like many centuries ago, there is still no sewage system at all, and its role is played by canals and sea currents, and all, excuse me, the waste of the Venetians is joyfully carried away into the Adriatic Sea during the ebb and flow of the tides, which completely suits the cheerful Venetians. Against this background, the tenderness at the sight of children frolicking in this very water is, to put it mildly, incomprehensible."

With great aplomb, I answered that the author knew everything... but I did this only after I had scoured the entire Internet in search of a worthy refutation. That is, how is it possible, there is no sewerage system, I thought, - after all, I have seen repair work in the canals more than once (they are closed for this time, the water is completely drained, and they are tinkering there without hindrance). There are many pipes laid at the bottom of the canals - one of them must be a sewer pipe - I had almost no doubt about this.

Imagine my surprise when, from the mass of information about plans to improve the sewer system, new knowledge crystallized - Venice really uses the same method as 500 years ago. The method, by the way, is quite effective: all Venetian palazzos have so-called septic tanks - in other words, settling tanks, at the bottom of which accumulates... uh... well, in general, a natural product :) And everything that is lighter than this waste actually ends up in the canal through holes in the wall (by the way, in Venice, vacuum cleaner boats work very effectively:).

Twice a day the tide ebbs and flows in the Venetian Lagoon, so all the water in the canals is constantly cleared, or rather replaced by new clean water. Therefore, stories about the terrible smell of Venice are greatly exaggerated. However, some amber is actually felt during strong low tides, which occur mainly at night. Then these sewer holes turn out to be above the water level and, accordingly, a smell appears, which in the literature has a veiled name ""eau du canal".

By the way, I laughed very hard when, in my research, I came across the blog of an Italian guy who “came in large numbers” to Venice (apparently, a student). Soon after moving, he also had a question: is there even a sewer system in Venice? He just formulated it with youthful spontaneity: “Does all of Venice really constantly poop in the canal?” :) The guy decided to check this empirically: he pulled the cistern cord, rushed headlong to the window and saw that water had flowed out of the hole in the wall, but not Moreover:) The guy cheered up a little when he didn’t see any solid residues floating into the canal, but the experiment didn’t end there. Next, he poured dishwashing detergent into the toilet, drained the water and again ran to the window - foam flowed from the sewer hole exposed by the tide! Oh horror - the connection turned out to be direct and immediate!

As a very impressionable person, I immediately shared the terrible discovery with my husband, which caused him to have a fit of great joy. Well, come on, he laughed, but how do you think the sewage system in big cities works? Well, imagine - there are pipes, they lead to the same settling tanks, but somewhat larger and somewhat more advanced, and then the water (purified, but not sterile) is still discharged into rivers, seas and other places from which we drink and in which we swim. And indeed, I remembered my recent walk not far from the discharge of such water into our mountain stream - the smell of detergents is still very noticeable!

At first I was upset, and then I remembered Vladimir Voinovich and his Ivan Chonkin :)

By the way, all this only applies to the historical center of Venice; newer peripheral areas are connected to the city sewerage system. The islands seem to be connected too.

As illustrations, I took photographs of winter, autumn and spring floods in a completely random order. The post was written specifically in connection with floods, so I don’t have any other pictures :)

So everything is fine, gentlemen tourists! And floods are, perhaps, even a blessing, because they clean beautiful Venice better than any sewer truck. I read an interview with one of the former Venetian mayors about the protective structures being built. So the mayor there expressed a timid fear that these structures, by stopping water exchange in the canals, would cause another problem - stagnation of water and, accordingly, its pollution. Eh, eternal dualism :)

The moral of this fragrant fable is simple: I still love Venice, I will go there as often as before. But! I will splash around in high water on San Marco exclusively in high rubber boots - out of harm's way :)

How does Venice live without sewerage?

To some this will seem funny, to others absurd, but in a city that spent a lot of money on organizing sewerage, there is still no sewerage!

A reasonable question arises: where does everything go that, contrary to human will, according to the laws established by nature, is daily formed in the bodies of Venetians and guests of this unique city?

The answer is quite unexpected. It all “disappears” into the channels. The canals carry water and waste into the Grand Canal, and it then flows, along with all its “goods,” into... Where do you think? You'll never guess - to the Adriatic Sea! The city is built in such a way that all wastewater is carried into the lagoon with the ebb and flow of the tides. Thanks to this, there is always clean water in the canals. The mechanism for flushing the canals is based on the type of gas exchange (oxygen / carbon dioxide) in the human lungs.

The Venice Lagoon is 56.5 kilometers long and 9.6 kilometers wide. The lagoon is separated from the Adriatic Sea by a sand spit with three straits - Malomocco, Lido, Chioggia. These three currents clean all city canals. And thus, Venice, glorified by artists and composers and attracting ardent lovers, does without a central sewer system, which is available in all progressive parts of the planet. Despite the lack of sewerage, there are toilets in Venice. Prices for visiting them vary depending on the season.

This is only a small part of the information that Russian travelers, returning as part of an excursion group from Venice on a tourist bus, gleaned from their laptops and smartphones. And what pushed everyone to this session of self-education was a not very pleasant incident that happened to one tourist, Veronica Stepygina, while sailing in a gondola along the canal.

Since she was not used to moving in such means, at some point, as a result of an awkward turn of her body, she dropped her purse, which contained a certain amount of pocket money and a credit card, into the water. The gondolier wanted to help the victim out and was already reaching out with his oar to get the loss out of the water, but she, having heard a lot of various technical details about these canals even earlier, flatly refused - she fell into hysterics, kicked her legs, waved her arms, almost turned the boat over and said some more there are many different words that are nothing new even for a Venetian.

As a result, at the end of the boat trip, the poor thing found herself without her purse; her friend Christina helped her pay for lunch at the restaurant, and she also gave her a tablet of her validol, since Veronica’s validol floated into the Adriatic Sea with her purse.

All the way back the bus interior was buzzing like a disturbed beehive. Someone was seething, someone was calming someone down, some were jabbering vyingly that in Moscow and the Moscow region (it was from these places that the group was selected) there had been no problems with sewerage for a long time, everything was clean and civilized. Of course, the production of PVC pipes for sewage is clearly established there - these are advanced technologies and product quality.

Thanks to modern developments, both external sewerage and internal sewerage are organized very successfully.

Someone vowed to never set foot in this Venice again, “and tell others.” You can, of course, “not even step.” But if they, for example, did not have laptops (which is difficult to imagine) or could not read at all (which is even more difficult to imagine), then perhaps they would not have learned all this information. And as you know, the less you know, the better you sleep. Tourists, of course, may not go there. What about the indigenous people? They somehow live there from generation to generation! And they're fine. So everything in this life is comparative and relative...

Where do you think the contents of antique Venetian chamber pots go? Don’t you think so? :) That’s right - I also didn’t ask myself this question until September 26 of this year.

However, on this fateful day, the entry “And yet she is sinking” (about sinking Venice, if anyone is interested) appeared in my journal. The post unexpectedly received a bunch of comments. Among them was this: “Does the author of the post know that in Venice, like many centuries ago, there is still no sewage system at all, and its role is played by canals and sea currents, and all, excuse me, the waste of the Venetians is joyfully carried away into the Adriatic Sea during the ebb and flow of the tides, which completely suits the cheerful Venetians. Against this background, the tenderness at the sight of children frolicking in this very water is, to put it mildly, incomprehensible."

By the way, I laughed very hard when, in my research, I came across the blog of an Italian guy who “came in large numbers” to Venice (apparently, a student). Soon after moving, he also had a question: is there even a sewer system in Venice (I translate literally, a shit pipeline)? He just formulated it with youthful spontaneity: “Does all of Venice really constantly poop in the canal?” :) The guy decided to check this empirically: he pulled the cistern cord, rushed headlong to the window and saw that water had flowed out of the hole in the wall, but not Moreover:) The guy cheered up a little when he didn’t see any solid residues floating into the canal, but the experiment didn’t end there. Next, he poured dishwashing detergent into the toilet, drained the water and again ran to the window - foam flowed from the sewer hole exposed by the tide! Oh horror - the connection turned out to be direct and immediate!

At first I was upset, and then I remembered Vladimir Voinovich and his Ivan Chonkin. And also the immortal phrase about the cycle of shit in nature :)) And you can’t argue against a classic :)

By the way, all this only applies to the historical center of Venice; newer peripheral areas are connected to the city sewerage system. The islands seem to be connected too.

11.

Venice. Look into the well and not die. December 9th, 2015

It is impossible not to notice that wells are everywhere in Venice. Despite the fact that water is now supplied to the city, no one is going to destroy the wells, of which there are over 2,000, and moreover, they are still an urgent need. Although now they are all sealed just in case for sanitary reasons, the liquid in them is too contaminated with microorganisms harmful to health. But there is no doubt that if there is an urgent need, the wells will be opened and water will flow from them again.

By the way, they were sealed quite recently, about 50 years ago. Although water was brought to the city much earlier, wells were still the most necessary of all the structures once erected in Venice. Moreover, their builders were haunted by two dangers: how to find fresh water in the middle of the salty sea, and how to protect drinking water wells from flooding during floods. The ancient architects coped brilliantly with the first task.

The wells are not as deep as they seem. It was difficult to get to the aquifers beyond the silt and scree on the islands, and most of the wells are ancient cisterns, known since Roman times, into which rainwater was drained through pipes, filtered and discharged into the main part of the tank.

Most of the wells in Venice are public, located in squares - campos - or streets, a smaller number are private, in courtyards, patios or basements of houses. But there were also deeper wells that penetrated sedimentary rocks into aquifers and drew drinking water.

Even in the courtyard of the Palazzo Ducale, the Doge's palace, there are huge marble and bronze wells. Of course, they were sealed long ago, and no one knows the state of the water in them today, but there is no doubt that if there is an urgent need, they can be easily cleaned and put into operation.

Another interesting observation: the beautiful bases and rings of wells are nothing more than worn-out bases and capitals of columns of various buildings. sometimes Roman, which it was decided to preserve for their power and beauty. Practically, looking at the wells, you see the history of ancient Venice, and even the whole of Rome.

Floods were a real disaster for wells. If on the high islands everything was fine with them, then in the low-lying part, just in the area of the often flooded Piazza San Marco, the water could overflow and then trouble would occur. It was very difficult to clear cisterns and wells of sea water.

Another thing that dictated the careful separation of drinking water from sea water was the COMPLETE absence of sewerage in Venice. Moreover, as such, there is no sewerage system in Venice to this day.

Yes, yes, you understood everything correctly, even today the sewage from the houses of Venice drains directly into the canals and into the lagoon. It seems incredible, but it's true! This is dictated by two considerations: firstly, in Venice there are no harmful industries to poison the waters of the bay, and the only large plant - an oil refinery - is located on the mainland. In addition, there is no point even today in pulling pipes into the city to drain sewage; they safely go into the sea and are lost in it without a trace. The city itself was built quite competently from the very beginning, and all its wastewater was carried into the lagoon with constant ebbs and flows, thanks to which the canals always have the purest water. The very mechanism of the currents existing in the city, thanks to properly laid channels, is similar to gas exchange (oxygen - carbon dioxide) and ventilation of air in the lungs of a person. Small sewer canals carry wastewater into the Grand Canal, which in turn into the lagoon. The lagoon is separated from the Adriatic Sea by a sand spit, which has three straits - Chioggia, Lido and Malomocco. The three above-mentioned straits, thanks to the currents they form, clean all the canals in the city, thereby allowing the city to successfully do without the usual city sewerage system. Therefore, you will never find any poop, slop or heavy smell of rot in the waters of Venice. A healthy city is like a living organism - it lives and breathes in full force.