ROME– The Tiber, now more resembling a swamp, is inhabited by ducks, gulls, and garbage. Spring has finally arrived in Rome. The sun is bright, birds fly around and children follow their parents as crowds fill the city. 

 Next to the Isola Tiberina under Ponte Garibaldi the stream is stronger and forms small cascades. Consequently, plastic bottles flow there with no possibility of going elsewhere; as if stuck in one of the circles described in Dante’s Inferno in The Divine Comedy. Balls, plastic bags, bottles, and pieces of unidentified objects float all together.

 People walk past arguing why plants on the side are interspersed with plastic bags, rather than flowers. An old wooden platform of a bus company that once used to offer tours of Rome by boat, rather than the usual bus tours, lies right on the sidewalk which adjoins the Tiber.

The platform is falling to pieces, yet nobody seems to have thought that it should be removed. The question is how it did not get destroyed by this winter’s rains, which raised the Tiber’s water level to the extent that Romans were worried the water might overflow onto the streets.

 A solution seems to have been available between 2005 and 2009, when there was a service active in the Tiber area stretching from Ponte Milvio up to Isola Tiberina called “Flavus Tiber”, or the blonde Tiber: a nine-meter-long catamaran equipped with an enormous basket responsible for collecting the garbage floating in the Tiber. Only in that section of the river, the garbage collector gathered more than 200 tons of garbage each year.

 Unfortunately, this service was suspended in Sabaudia, in province of Latina (Lazio), and now it is up to the Municipality of Minturno to clean that section of the seacoast.  “My service was operating until 2009,” states Marco Valerio Alessandrini, creator of the project, and owner of Flavus Tiber, “The activity had been appreciated by the fire brigade, then the project was relocated until 2010, and forgotten.” It is time to take it out and bring it back to where it was in 2005.

 Currently there is Tevereterno, “an international organization that cultivates the revival of Rome’s Tiber river,” as explained on their website. “Holding branches in the United States, it is sponsored by the New York Foundation for the Arts (NYFA), a tax-exempt organization, and recognized in Italy as a non-profit association (onlus).” The goal of the organization is public programming and community outreach to protect, and encourage the maintenance of the river.

 In fact, this year Tevereterno welcomes South African artist William Kentridge to create a work of art of 550 meters on the sides of the Tiber between Ponte Sisto and Ponte Mazzini. The mural called “Triumph and Laments” includes figures up to 9 meters tall, which walk against the current and narrate Roman history.

 Certainly Teverterno’s project is to be admired for it’s drawing the attention to the river; however, more effective actions have to be implemented. Rome's mayor Ignazio Marino should be reminded of the importance of the river, for reasons such as the environment, the citizens, and for the sake of Italy’s dignity.

 Italy is mocked around the world because of its political state. Nonetheless, we should maintain our dignity when it comes to preserving this magical city also loved by those who are the first to laugh at all the rest.