Chanioporta

Repairing a monument that is also a main road

Chanioporta is one of the three monumental gates of the Venetian fortifications of Heraklion, alongside the Jesus Gate and the Gate of St George. By the early twentieth century the city had outgrown them — the gates were too narrow for carriages, so sections of wall were demolished where the main roads ran out to the countryside.

Of all the breaches cut through the walls, only three were ever bridged. The first was Chanioporta, in 1915: an opening fifteen metres wide, spanned by a broad stone arch. That arch is what carries the traffic today, between the historic centre and the western suburbs.

A century on, the inside of it was failing. Severe damp, water running through the vault, transverse cracks, and binding mortar that had turned to dust. The work was to stabilise and restore it without altering the architecture of the monument — and without stopping the traffic that made it necessary in the first place.

Άρση επικινδυνότητας του νεωτερικού ανοίγματος στη Χανιόπορτα, Ηράκλειο