Rome's New Metro Line: Walking the Walk.

The pristine travertine stairs and escalators at the Lodi station, on its pre-opening day tour

On June 29 Rome's transit system accomplished what many thought it might never do - it opened new Metro line C with 6 stations.  In theory line C had been opened earlier, further out of Rome, but that was just a refurbishing of an above-ground train line already in existence.  The 6 stations and 5.4 kilometers of track opened recently are the true accomplishment, because they actually put line C IN Rome, rather than way outside of it.

Men in Black

We took advantage of a rather unusual offer in late April. The 6 newest stations were open a few hours on April 29 for self-guided tours, even though there were no trains running.  To see them all, one had to drive or walk between them.  So we made it our goal to do a 6-station trek, and back.  We figured, oh, 5+ km x 2 - we had to get back to our moto without the metro, of course - that's only 7 miles and we're used to that.  Oh, how wrong we were... but for now to the features of that day - the stations.

The line is billed as from "Mirti" to "Lodi" because the outer part of the line, the old train line, is already operating.  But Lodi is the most central of the Rome portion of the line - to date. The line still doesn't hook up with either of the other 2 operating lines - A and B, but it will when the San Giovanni station is added in, supposedly, 2016.

A visitor checks out the line - it's the part in red we're visiting.

So we showed up at the "Lodi" station - named for its proximity to Piazza Lodi - at noon, when the stations were to open.  Well, we were 5 minutes early.  So you can see the guys in black blocking the entrance until the appointed hour. And it turns out, guys in black were at every station, being very one-might-say fascist-like in ordering the few people coming to see the stations which way to go in and out, protecting fenced areas, and the like.  Part of the ambiance of the day.

Lodi is undistinguished from the outside.  It has only surface level entrances.  Below it has some of the grand travertine staircases and it looks wonderfully shiny new, of course.  So we dutifully walked down all the levels, and up, and marched on to the next station.

Pigneto station skylight, outside

Pigneto comes next, and this is a long-awaited station in a rapidly gentrifying, even hipster neighborhood of Rome.  Pigneto's station is more interesting, with an enormous skylight.  And here we learned about the "TBM", "Tunnel Boring Machine" (yep, that's Italian) used to create the metro openings below ground without opening up the ground from the surface and then

skylight, inside

recovering it, as Rome has done for prior lines.

Display photo of Pigneto station under construction.

This process minimizes the problems of archeological finds.  As former Mayor Rutelli put it to us once, one can dig at 35 meters, but not between 15 and 35 meters.  Of course, since it's Pigneto, we were treated to lots of street art as we came back up and started our walk to our third station, Malatesta.

Leftist graffiti in Pigneto

Dianne interviewed by radio reporter at Malatesta station

Malatesta is one of the more elaborate stations. That's the reason, we assume, it was selected for Mayor Marino's visit.  So it was full of people. Enough so that a radio reporter interviewed me, in Italian, on my reactions to the new stations. And our timing was good enough that Bill got a photo of the mayor.

Photo op for mayor (red tie) and cohorts.

Unlike the other stations, this one had a train car open to visit.  Helps to have the Mayor around.  It was here we learned from the instructive panels that this line is "driverless" (again, Italian).  Whoa, that's a bit scary.

Inside the cars

"Data (I Numeri) of the "Driverless trains"":
80 km/hr maximum; 35 km/hour normal; 1200 passengers
per trip; + or - 30 centimeters - leeway in terms of where
they stop at the stations.

Open stairs lead down into the Malatesta station

Walking out of the Malatesta station to the next one, Teano, we were reminded that, yes, old Rome still exists.

We passed some old medieval-like buildings, towers, agricultural land, and then a pretty strange building for Rome.

Opera sets were stored here.

We read later it was built in the 1950s and stored opera sets and costumes!  It's been repurposed partly as a school and community center.  And, across from it is perhaps the most interestingly-designed station. The ATAC Web site tells us that the "atrium" is meant to be used for commercial activity and cultural events.

Teano station

Atrium for commerce and cultural events, Teano

The prosaic Gardenie station.

1930s public housing in the far-flung suburbs.

The 5th station, Gardenie, again is ordinary. Outside it we were reminded that the Fascists built public housing out this far in the 1930s, sending workers far away from where the jobs might be, and sending any potential challengers to the regime out of communication with the city.






















We ended up at Mirti in Centocelle, a once disparaged suburb of Rome that is reviving a bit, and certainly the metro line will help that.

That's a victory sign at Mirti, as well as storm clouds brewing.

 Besides having time to give the victory sign, we found a tour group in this station and we learned more about the entire project (including the use of the TBMs).

Tour group at the Mirti station.

At this point, we figured we probably had walked close to 10 miles - the 5.4 km is the way the Metro or crow flies.  Walking between stations is much more circuitous.  Plus we went up and down the stairs at each station (the escalators weren't operating). And it was starting to rain.

Dianne checks the various transit options.

Walking another 4 or 5 miles back to our moto was ruled out.  While celebrating our 6-station triumph with a glass of wine in Centocelle at a familiar bar there, we discovered the "trenino," or urban train, was not far away.  So we walked over to it, through the familiar non-glitzy underpass of existing Rome transit, to catch the train back reasonably close to "Lodi" and our moto.

What the 'normal' transit underground looks like.

The Italians are good at design, and these stations are striking in their pristine state.  We don't want to think what they might look like if the graffiti artists get busy on them.  This project connects some of these far flung suburbs and we hope makes Romans living in them feel more in touch with the city itself.

Video in the station teaching kids to hang on.

We'll do a check in 2016 to see how the system is progressing.


Dianne

Study in black and white

Francesco Rutelli: on Building atop Rome's Ancient Heritage

Former Rome Mayor Francesco Rutelli was explaining why it was so difficult to build the Metro "C" line, which at one point was designed to run from Piazza Venezia to Piazza del Popolo, under via del Corso.  All the ground beneath that route, he said, to a depth of about 25 meters, was covered with

Oops!  Excavations for "C" line at Piazza Venezia reveal
extensive ancient ruins.  Better cover them up!

ancient ruins.  To avoid destroying the city's heritage, one had to go deeper--below 30 meters.  That could be done, he added, but one problem remained: "you could not get out"--that is, you couldn't get people out of that deeply buried Metro line, or for that matter into it, without doing untold damage. 









Rutelli, Mayor of Rome from 1993 to 2001, one-time cultural minister and now Senator, told several personal stories to underline his thesis at a recent talk at John Cabot University in Rome on "Contemporary Transformations in the Most Complex City in the World."  The interplay of

archaeology with contemporary building seems obvious, but it took on  new meaning for us with Rutelli's detailed and personal knowledge of Rome's archaeological layers. (Rutelli studied architecture at the University of Rome/La Sapienza.) 

Protesters at the opening of Meier's "box" for the Ara Pacis,
April 2006

Piazza Augusto Imperatore, which shows up on Rome the Second Time's Top 40 list at #9, sparked discussion from the audience after Rutelli presented slides of Richard Meier's "box" for the Ara Pacis and the discovery below of an ancient Roman harbor - that prevented putting the Lungotevere road underground  - at least for now.  We hadn't known that Rutelli alone made the decision to engage U.S. architect Richard Meier.  Why not a competition?  Or at least an Italian?  "If I had chosen an Italian," he said,
"the resulting squabbles would have been like those of a Sardinian village, lasting centuries."  As a result of his choice, however, Italian architects (left out of consideration) are irate; one said Meier's building belonged on the outskirts of Los Angeles; another likened it to McDonald's.   The right wing also detests the building.  We were there for the opening and their protests in April, 2006. 

And now a professor of architectural history asks Rutelli - why no interplay with the fascist architecture of the piazza?  With all the fascist writing on the buildings around Augustus' tomb?
Rutelli pointed out one reason he selected Meier was for his "rationalist" style, which naturally harmonized with the monumentalist Fascist architecture of the piazza. 

Parco della Musica, also known as the Auditorium, is Renzo Piano's very successful (in our opinion) set of music halls in the Flaminio quarter.  We also have seen the pre-Roman village partially unearthed during the building of the Parco della Musica structures.  What we didn't know, and Rutelli

Piano's Parco della Musica.  Handsome, but too many
stairs, not enough elevators, some think. 

relayed, was that his administration was absolutely certain there were no ruins in the area - that was one reason the location was selected.  And yet, there they were, the remains of a 2700 year-old rural village that no one had ever mentioned or knew about, according to the former Mayor.  Hence, Piano had to redesign his complex.  A cinema and hotel were left out to accommodate the display of the ruins.  And, added an audience member - is that the reason there are too many steps and not enough elevators?  Ah, said Rutelli, Piano loved his structure and there was considerable negotiation with him over elevators.  In other words, be glad you have the few you do.  He also relayed the story of a building in Pienza, a perfect design by an architect who left out kitchens and bathrooms - so that the architecture would be absolutely perfect. Parco della Musica is on one of the 4 tours in our new book, Modern Rome: 4 Great Walks for the Curious Traveler. See below for more information.

Palazetto Zuccari

Rutelli's practical side showed itself in two other projects.  One began with a 1994 competition to gut
and totally reconstruct the Bibliotheca Hertziana--that is, the interior of the 17th-century Mannerist Palazetto Zuccari (on via Gregoriana, near the Spanish steps).

The new library sits atop this matrix of steel beams.

In 2001, construction revealed the remains of the Horti Luculliani, gardens from the Republican era.  Architect Juan Navarro Baldeweg and engineers found a solution: above the ruins, they suspended
huge steel girders--essentially a floating, artificial basement.  On top of that, they put the new library. 

The new library.  The 17th century?  Gone. 

Rutelli had more to do with the 2nd project: an elevator for the Altare della Patria, also known as the

Rutelli's much-reviled elevator.  Great
views from the top!

Vittoriano.  Indeed, it was his idea.  Frankly acknowledging the criticism he's received for this intervention, Rutelli defended it, emphasizing that the elevator was close to the (back of) the structure, but not part of it, not attached to it.  "It could be removed in a day," he said.

After the talk, at a reception hosted by John Cabot, we gave Rutelli a copy of our book, Rome the Second Time: 15 Itineraries that Don't Go to the Coliseum."   A few minutes later, as we left the building a few steps behind the mayor, he turned, smiled, and said, "non vado al Coliseo" (I'm not going to the Coliseum!).

Dianne and Bill
 Modern Rome: 4 Great Walks for the Curious Traveler.  In addition to the tour of  the 21st-century music and art center of Flaminio (including Parco della Musica), along with Mussolini's Foro Italico, also the site of the 1960 summer Olympics, Modern Rome features three other walks: the "garden city" suburb of Garbatella, the 20th-century suburb of EUR, and a stairways walk in classic Trastevere. 

This 4-walk book is available in all print and eBook formats The eBook is $1.99 through amazon.com and all other eBook sellers.  See the various formats at smashwords.com. 

Modern Rome: 4 Great Walks for the Curious Traveler now is also available in print, at amazon.com, Barnes and Noble, independent bookstores,  and other retailers; retail price $5.99.

Monti, Gentrified

Most of our readers will know of Monti, the enchanting neighborhood (technically, a rione) located between via Nazionale, the Coliseum, and via dei Fori Imperiali. And most would agree with Monica Lamer, writing in Business Week in September, 1998, who described Monti as "the most authentic and tourist-free district in the modern city." "The district," Lamer continues, "has maintained its flavor and today attracts people looking for affordable homes in a unique neighborhood." Monti has long been one of our favorite haunts; in Rome the Second Time, we've introduced readers
to two of our favorite places: the jazz club Charity Café, on via Panisperna, and Al Vino Al Vino, a busy wine bar around the corner on via dei Serpenti (photo at left).

Monti still has picturesque streets and atmosphere to spare, but our views on the area have changed just a bit after reading Michael Herzfeld's Evicted from Eternity: The Restructuring of Modern Rome (2009). Despite the general subtitle, the book is all about Monti's recent history.

Herzfeld, a Harvard anthropologist who did field work in the rione over several years in the 1990s and the 2000s, argues that Monti is not what it used to be, fifty or even twenty years ago.
Monti no longer is home to ordinary, working-class Romans plying their crafts and trades in small shops; it no longer sustains a local, working-class culture; no longer densely populated, it cannot sustain the sort of local market for food, clothing, and household items that serve and sustain so many Rome neighborhoods--that, in a sense, define them as dynamic neighborhoods.

Monti has been gentrified. Hotels and short-term lets for tourists. Trendy shops.


The process of gentrification began in the 1950s and 1960s, when, as Rome's population grew rapidly, Monti's fell. In the 1980s, as the area became more popular, rents turned up, and some locals were forced to find accommodations in cheaper, new housing developments on the city's outskirts. Still, until the late 1990s, renters were protected from eviction by a legal requirement that owners demonstrate "a pressing need" for the property. That legal protection was eliminated in a 1998 housing law, supposedly designed to protect property owners from squatters. Under the new law, owners had the legal right to evict tenants for any reason. And they did. The 1998 law had support from the right, who thought the old law gave too much protection to tenants and, more remarkably, from Mayor Francesco Rutelli's (1993-2001) leftist coalition.

Herzfeld is critical of Rutelli, who lived in Monti for a time as a child, and whose wife was born there. He labels Rutelli a "bourgeois leftist from Parioli."
He links Rutelli to powerful construction companies that were building inexpensive housing outside the city, and he laments Rutelli's neoliberal vision of the city," sustained by "market logic," that included support for gentrification and for turning Monti into a mecca for tourists and living quarters for Rome's wealthy. Interestingly, this critique of Rutelli was shared at the time by Gianfranco Fini's right-wing Alleanza nazionale. "We do not wish," Fini said at the time, "for [Monti] to be deformed into an open museum."

As you walk around Monti, you can judge for yourself whether the area has been "deformed into an open museum." One place to engage that question is via degli Ibernesi, a short and narrow street at the southwestern end of the district.


In Evicted from Eternity, Herzfeld narrates in fascinating detail what happened on that street at #23, over a period of two decades beginning in the mid-1980s. In essence, 10 long-term residents of the 18th-century palazzo on the site fought a long, bitter, public battle against eviction, first against the Bank of Rome, then against Pirelli Tire, and a series of other owners, until 2006, when the remaining 5 residents were finally forced to leave the building--and the neighborhood--where most had lived for decades.

For those unable to visit the street, we offer this virtual tour of via degli Ibernesi; #23 is at the opposite end of the street, on the far right. http://www.freereservation.com/roma2/13.htm

Today, a Google search for via Ibernesi 23 brings up the Roman Forum Residences website, on which one can book a room in a luxury hotel. A description on the website reads: "A unique luxury accommodation created to evoke sensations: an intimate residence full of delightful surprises where traces of ancient Rome cohabit perfectly with the modern comforts that the most discerning travellers require."

Bill