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Venice wary of rise in cruise ship traffic

Critics fear erosion in old city; disaster brings new worry

The deadly grounding of the Costa Concordia off the Tuscan coast has sharpened the focus on the largely unchecked boom of these ever-larger luxury liners, and nowhere more so than in Venice, a fragile city already struggling against mass tourism and the steady deterioration of its underwater foundations. Critics say expanding cruise liner traffic through Venice creates not only a threat of accidents, but also air and water pollution, and the injection of 2 million more tourists a year.

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