Lido di Dante is a seaside resort located on the Emilia-Romagna coast, 7km from the city of Ravenna, Italy. The use of the beach for tourism, together with its serious erosion problems, started in the 1970's, make the field site interesting for coastal engineering, coastal geomorphology and coastal management studies. The beach of Lido di Dante is located between the Fiumi Uniti river's mouth in the north and Bevano river's mouth in the south. The northern part of the study area is protected by three groins and a parallel semi-submerged breakwater, while the southern part is undefended, therefore the site provides an excellent opportunity to synchronously study the dynamics of the defended and undefended beaches.
Of particular interested at Lido di Dante is the comparison between the modifications due to the nearshore hydrodynamics and morphodynamics imposed by the submerged shore-parallel breakwaters as opposed to the hydrodynamics and morphodynamics observed in the unprotected area. The unprotected beach is backed by a dune ridge, on average 2-3 high above Mean Sea Level. The dunes are suffering consistent frontal erosion in the lee of the southernmost groin, while they seem more stable moving away from the structures. They form a continuous ridge down to the Bevano inlet. At this point, the meandering of the river mouth is currently eroding them laterally. The ARGUS station of Lido di Dante has been installed in a natural reserve area, using a wooden tower 18m high.
The first camera oriented southwards look at the unprotected beach while the other 3 cameras look at the protected area. The objectives of the project in this site involve Safety & Maintenance beach profile (long term stability of the coast, short term stability of buildings and beach and dunes, stability of defence structures), Recreation & Tourism (space for beach tourism, swimming & swimming hazard, bio-chemical swimming hindrance), Shipping & Navigation (navigation hazards for windsurfs & small sailing boats), Natural Values (quality of the beach in terms of pollution on the beach, density of seaside users, dune ecosystem.)