Via Donau (sometimes stylized as viadonau) is a subsidiary of the

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

n Ministry for Transport, Innovation and Technology (BMVIT) tasked with the preservation and development of the

Danube The Danube ( ; ) is a river that was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire and today connects 10 European countries, running through their territories or being a border. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for , pa ...

waterway. It was established in 2005.

History

Via Donau was established on January 1, 2005, by the Ministry for Transport,

Innovation Innovation is the practical implementation of ideas that result in the introduction of new goods or services or improvement in offering goods or services. ISO TC 279 in the standard ISO 56000:2020 defines innovation as "a new or changed entity ...

and Technology. It was formed by a merger of the Austrian Donau-Betriebs AG, the Austrian Danube-Technik GmbH, the Via Donau Development Company for

Telematics Telematics is an interdisciplinary field encompassing telecommunications, vehicular technologies ( road transport, road safety, etc.), electrical engineering (sensors, instrumentation, wireless communications, etc.), and computer science (multimedi ...

and

Navigation Navigation is a field of study that focuses on the process of monitoring and controlling the movement of a craft or vehicle from one place to another.Bowditch, 2003:799. The field of navigation includes four general categories: land navigation, ...

on the Danube, and the privatized waterways organization.

Company

Via Donau executes federal tasks in waterway and shipping. It has about 270 employees based at five locations, one main office, two field offices, and nine locks on the Danube.

Locations

Tech Gate Vienna Tech Gate Vienna is a science and technology park in the City of Vienna, Austria, situated in the 22nd district Donaustadt. It was built between 1999 and 2005 following the plans from architects Wilhelm Holzbauer and Sepp Frank in an area called ...

(main office) * Location Brigittenauer Sporn (Vienna) * Location

Angern Angern is a municipality in the Börde district in Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. On 1 January 2010 it absorbed the former municipalities Bertingen, Mahlwinkel and Wenddorf.Aschach, Upper Austria) * Location Central including the field office Grein ( Krems, Lower Austria) * Location East ( Bad Deutsch-Altenburg, Lower Austria) Field office: * Persenbeug (Lower Austria) Locks on the Danube: * Lock Nussdorf (Vienna) * Lock management West (Abwinden, Aschach, Ottensheim) * Lock management Centre (Melk, Persenbeug, Wallsee) * Lock management (Altenwörth, Freudenau, Greifenstein)

Tasks

Infrastructure management Via Donau is tasked with the maintenance of riverbanks and bank constructions, the upkeep of shipping routes, and the current measurement and appropriation of hydrographic and hydrologic data. Flood protection Via Donau is responsible for the establishment and maintenance of flood protection facilities on the March (Morava),

Thaya The Thaya ( cs, Dyje ) is a river in Central Europe, the longest tributary to the river Morava. Its drainage basin is . It is ( with its longest source river German Thaya) long and meanders from west to east in the border area between Lower Au ...

, and

rivers. Via Donau is also responsible for the current largest flood protection project on the March and lower

rivers. As the managing office of the Danube Flood Control Agency (DHK), Via Donau is responsible for preventive and protective measures with regard to the DHK's flood control structures in

Vienna en, Viennese , iso_code = AT-9 , registration_plate = W , postal_code_type = Postal code , postal_code = , timezone = CET , utc_offset = +1 , timezone_DST ...

and

Lower Austria Lower Austria (german: Niederösterreich; Austro-Bavarian: ''Niedaöstareich'', ''Niedaestareich'') is one of the nine states of Austria, located in the northeastern corner of the country. Since 1986, the capital of Lower Austria has been Sankt P ...

. Ecological measures on the Danube The company also conducts numerous

river engineering River engineering is a discipline of civil engineering which studies human intervention in the course, characteristics, or flow of a river with the intention of producing some defined benefit. People have intervened in the natural course and b ...

and re-naturalisation projects. The re-naturalisation of the

is creating near-natural riverbanks and new habitats for animals and plants. Traffic management on the Austrian Danube Terminal Freudenau 021

Along with DoRIS (Danube River Information Services), Via Donau has participated in the development of a decisive tool for inland waterway transport on the Austrian Danube. In 2006, DoRIS commenced operations and had set the standard for navigation information systems all along the Danube. In addition, Via Donau supports the implementation of River Information Services in the entire Danube region. Developing and strengthening inland waterway transport In 2005, the “National Danube Shipping Action Plan” (NAP) came into effect in Austria, where around 70 individual measures were defined for strengthening and developing shipping. The NAP was given substantial support during its development by Via Donau, and defines key aspects of future Austrian shipping policy.{{coord, 48.2326, N, 16.4138, E, source:wikidata, display=title Danube Government of Austria Inland waterway authorities Transport organisations based in Austria