The Italian minister of culture announced the winning bid to restore the Colosseum’s arena on Sunday, a project that will permit guests to view the archeological wonder from ground level as quickly as 2023.
The 2,000 year old structure is presently floorless, the ruins of the underground levels’ walls and tunnels exposed to the open air save for a modest platform.
A Milan engineering firm beat 10 competitors who answered a 2020 contact for submissions with its vision involving rotating wooden slats that would permit organic ventilation and lighting of the reduced levels.
“It’s another step forward towards rebuilding the arena, an ambitious project that will aid the conservation of the archeological structures while getting back to the original image of the Colosseum and its quality as a complex scenographic machine,” mentioned culture minister Dario Franceschini.
With the new floor, guests to the Colosseum will be in a position to admire the treasured monument from the centre of the arena — a view as soon as reserved for gladiators and slaves as they ready to meet their doom.
Franceschini plans to host the Rome G20 culture summit at the Colosseum in July and it might serve as a venue for other significant cultural events.
The Colosseum’s executive archaeologist Alfonsina Russo mentioned building of the arena — which will be the topic of a Europe-wide contact for bids of about 15 million euros — really should commence by the finish of the year or early 2022.
She mentioned the new 3,000 square metre (32,300 square foot) floor really should be prepared for guests in 2023.
Before the pandemic about 25,000 men and women toured the world-popular monument day-to-day, and some 18.5 million euros have been set aside for the project.
The program presented on Sunday consists of an totally removable structure made of accoya, a modified, tough wood.
The slats will be rigged with a rotation technique meant to permit light and air to circulate to underground passages beneath the location.
The rain water that presently pools there will be collected and used to provide the toilets of Rome’s most visited monument.