How Not To Come Off Monte Mario

 

We 2 "pilgrims" reflected in the glass of the now-closed Lo Zodiaco cafe'

at the top of Monte Mario. Great views still available.

Never ones to shy away from hard truths, your RSTers went last year to mourn at the site of the now-closed Lo Zodiaco cafe' (the bar also is closed). Not long ago, it was a lovers' (and families' and anyone liking a good view) hangout (- he path along the front of it is called "vialetto degli Innamorati" ["Lovers' Lane"]).

We walked up our usual way, from via Gormezzina, near Piazzale Maresciallo Giardino (admitttedly around a closed gate - but the "herd path" was clear), enjoying the wide switchbacks on sampietrini (cobblestones) mostly maintained by the non-profit RomaNatura (the informational boards along the way now are mostly destroyed). (Monte Mario came in at #11 on RST's Top 40, and is an itinerary in our guidebook, Rome the Second Time.)

We checked out the usual cafes in Piazzale delle Medaglie d'Oro (at the end of it, you can see signs for the via Francigena--St. Francis's way, now tantalizingly close to its Vatican destination). Then, in hindsight foolishly, we decided to take the paths that ran down and across the winding, very curvy, not always well-banked road we had scootered down several times, but also had walked down: viale dei Cavalieri di Vittorio Veneto, just below the Hotel Rome Cavalieri.

MAP AT END OF POST

Except the paths seemed to be nonexistent, and we found ourselves plastered against the retaining walls in an effort not to be run over.

Left photo, paths in bad shape.

Friends to whom we described our trek later that night said, "oh, you mean K-2"--that's the name for this outrageously speedy and dangerous separated "highway."

Right photo, Dianne hesitates as any shoulder is about to disappear.

Left photo. No shoulders - or even ditches or brush - wide enough to feel safe.

On closer inspection, the road we just came down on still sports a slogan to the Lazio Ultra (generally right-wing) Gabriele Sandri, killed in 2007 (hence the "Vive"), about whom Bill posted in 2011 here.

We finally got off this road on via Romeo Romei, which skirts the back of (more like a parking lot for) the national Appeals Court. It was under heavy scaffolding on the day we walked by.

All of which is to say, we won't do this one again!

Map below shows Piazzale delle Medaglie d'Oro at top left, Lo Zodiaco (as if it were still open) top center, and the walking path switchbacks leading up to it going off at right.

The big curvy dark stuff in the center was "our path," i.e. the road, leading down to the Corte d'Appelo.

No, don't try this yourselves.

Dianne

Walking to Trullo: for Art's Sake

The plan seemed reasonable, to Bill, anyway.  We had had heard that the working-class Rome suburb of Trullo--we'd been there once before--had been redecorated by volunteer street artists, and we wanted to see the community in all its new glory.  We decided to walk--Bill did, anyway--from our apartment in Monteverde Vecchio, 6.4 google map kms (3-3/4 miles one way): down via dei Quattro Venti, right on via Portuense, across via Isacco Newton, left on via del Trullo.  Voila!





Via Portuense is one of Rome's less fashionable streets, but even so, not without interest.  Early on we noticed (right) a building that had once been a gas station, perhaps a car wash. Many elements, frequently modified.  Concrete block, air conditioning, a covered terrace, a nice old wall, a tattered banner and, of course, graffiti.  In a curious way, a delight.

Further on, a sad memorial to a tragic accident: a young woman, Valentina, had died at that spot.













And two very different buildings, side by side: on the left, what appeared to be a municipal building, constructed in the 1930s; on the right, an apartment complex, perhaps of 1970s vintage, with its brazen rounded balconies.

An architectural find on via
dell'Imbreciatto.  Modernist
brutalism, recent vintage.  

Just beyond, we discovered a flaw in our plan.  Via Isacco Newton is an enormous highway, and there are no sidewalks on the fast-moving portion of via Portuense that crosses it.  Only Evil Knievel would walk that route.  So we doubled back to via Pietro Frattini and turned south through the 'hoods, onto via dell'Imbreciatto, right onto a country road, right again along Isacco Newton and over it, on a bridge, then up the hill and down the hill into Trullo.  Including the doubling back, this route is about 8.2 km, or roughly 5 miles.









Trullo has, indeed, been upgraded, as your exhausted duo discovered.  We didn't see any burning trash cans this time around.  Many of the 1930s housing project buildings that dominate the area have been decorated in one way or another: some simply and playfully--the kind of work that could be done by an untrained crew with a bit of direction. There's lots of poetry, too.




Others have benefited from the first-rate work by professionals.   Several examples follow.

Many other buildings, including the market, sport wall art.  At left, the decorated wall of an eyeglass store. Below, the market.

"The voyage is a search for hidden courage that knows no bounds."

View from the bar.

There's a comfortable bar in the center of town where you can sit outside on the covered patio and watch the main street traffic and the kids playing in the park across the street.  Best on a Saturday.

Worth it.  But don't walk.  We took the bus home. Weak!
Bill

PS - Posts on other areas 'upgraded' with street art include those on Quadraro and the Nomentana train station.  The book, "Global Rome" also investigates this phenomenon.

In Trullo, even the trucks are painted!  The graffiti on the building at center is older, not part of the remodeling. 

American Embassy's new Sidewalk: Not for Walking

A sidewalk, but not for walking

The American embassy in Rome is housed in a grand 1890 building that was once home to Italy’s Queen Margaret.  It occupies all of a large, irregularly-shaped city block, with one side running along posh via Veneto.  Since 9/11, the building has been ringed by ugly fences and sand-filled barriers, a slapdash effort, we assume, to keep terrorists at a distance.  Those barriers and fences are now mostly gone, replaced by a wide, handsome sidewalk that surrounds the building.  Except you can’t walk on it.  That’s right: a sidewalk that isn’t for walking.  The sidewalk itself is bordered by a fence—handsome enough, and low enough to easily get over—but a fence nonetheless, and one policed by the guards that patrol the embassy’s several entrances.  

The embassy has effectively commandeered what once was public space around its building.  No parking for cars, and presumably no pedestrians, on the four streets that flank the grounds.  But Romans, being Romans, will walk in the street, and they are doing so now (see photo above), on the edge of those new sidewalks, sharing the busy streets with vehicles.  The expectation, we would imagine, was that pedestrians would use the opposite side of the surrounding streets, where the sidewalks are still sidewalks.  Most will--and some won’t, putting those walkers in peril.  Sooner or later one will be hit by a car or truck, and the embassy will have to justify building a broad sidewalk that wasn’t for walking.   
Bill