The defense of the city of Venice and of the lagoonal ecosystem: an ongoing challenge for geotechnical engineering|La difesa della città di Venezia e dell’ecosistema lagunare: una sfida continua per l’ingegneria geotecnica

The worldwide-known historic city of Venice continues to preserve a rather precarious equilibrium with the surrounding lagoon, although the margin of security is being eroded at increasing rate. The rate of environmental deterioration is being accelerated by the increasing frequency of the flooding of the historic city and surrounding lagoon caused by the natural eustatic rise of the sea level, by natural subsidence and by a regional man-induced subsidence, the latter particularly important in the last century. The paper, based on the Croce Conference given in Rome on the 16 December 2021, emphasizes the relevant role of geotechnical engineering, and especially site and laboratory investigations, monitoring, data analysis and interpretation and modelling of fundamental geotechnical issues for the preservation of city and surrounding lagoon.