Read: Preparing for the inevitable sea-level rise

From its earliest days, Venetian history has been punctuated by the grim, high-water marks of such storms. The Adriatic coast is littered with the sites of communities that did not survive those events. Armed with this certainty, Venetians undertook a massive engineering project—the MOSE barriers (Modulo Sperimentale Elettromeccanico, or “Experimental Electromechanical Module”; the acronym was chosen to sound like Moses, who divided the Red Sea.) The MOSE system is intended to block the channels connecting Venice’s lagoon with the Adriatic Sea in times of exceptionally high water. They’re essentially giant water gates on a hinge, which can open and close to act as floodgates. The barriers failed to work when the October storm struck, not because they were ill-conceived but because they were incomplete. After 30 years of planning, and 15 since ground was first broken, the project, initially slated to open in 2011, is running 11 years behind.

The delays can be chalked up to political and social problems. The MOSE system was conceived in the aftermath of the 1966 floods, and its urgency waned as memory of that event faded. From its inception, the project faced bitter opposition from a wide spectrum of critics, from Greenpeace to the Communist Refoundation Party. Some opponents feared that closing off the channels might damage the lagoon’s ecology; others opposed continued large boat access to the city, which MOSE’s design permits. Still, others were dismayed by its cost, along with the financial corruption that followed. And yet the October flooding proves that without the MOSE barriers, there is no hope that Venice will survive.

But Venetian climate adaptation has many faces, and not all of them are tragic. The towering shadow of the MOSE failure stands to overshadow smaller initiatives put in place in the barrier islands; the Venetian Lagoon, which surrounds the city; and the city itself.

The Venetian climate-adaptation repertoire is staged in four settings. The barrier islands that separate the Adriatic from the lagoon are the first line of defense against high water. The three inlets that cut through the islands where the tides surge and ebb constitute the second: Here, when completed, the MOSE barriers will shut when needed. Then comes the lagoon and, finally, the city. Large-scale engineering, which tends to get more attention, is confined to the MOSE barriers. Projects on the islands and within the lagoon focus on restoring damaged landforms and the habitats they offer to indigenous plants and animals. Meanwhile, urban adaptation campaigns are focused on dredging city canals and bolstering individual buildings.