A new and eco-sustainable Colosseum. This is the goal of the winning project of the Invitalia tender won by Milan Engineering. In fact, there will be a new surface of 3000 square meters which will constitute the arena of the Roman amphitheater, a very specific choice which involves the use of a material with a low environmental impact and reversible to favor the recycling of rainwater.
The new eco-sustainable Colosseum
The project was presented by the Minister of Culture Dario Franceschini and the director of the Archaeological Park of the Colosseum Alfonsina Russo. It is part of a larger project of the European Union to encourage urban regeneration processes that bring great benefits to architectural and landscape monuments. The new arena of the amphitheater will be an area of 3000 square meters in Accoya wood (material capable of reducing the killing of valuable species), and will cover the underlying spaces from atmospheric agents. The structure will present a new technology capable of reducing the water load and recovering rainwater to reuse it in the facilities of the Colosseum in Rome.
A movable wooden cover
The light and mobile wooden roof can be opened or closed to ensure both the view of the basements and their ventilation. In this way you will have a vision similar to the one present up to the end of the nineteenth century. The new arena "will allow you to visit the underground and see the majesty of the Colosseum from the center, as it has been for centuries ", said the Minister of Culture Dario Franceschini presenting the project 'Arena of the Colosseum'on Zoom. "The basement of the Colosseum must be seen from below, by visitors. Depriving them of this has no meaning and now it will be possible ", added the minister. The new arena will also allow for “cultural events of the highest level"Without, however, assured Franceschini, transforming the arena" into a place of entertainment ".
The words of Massimiliano Milan
The structure will be reversible, it will not touch the ancient structures and will be built on the original altitude, that of the Flavian era, but lighter. "The wooden slats have a highly technological content: rotating and translating they guarantee maximum flexibility both in the configurations that can be obtained, which are also of great importance from a philological point of view, and in the management of the spaces above the arena“, Explained Massimiliano Milan. "I know that the controversy will not be lacking, the Colosseum is our symbolic monument, it is right that we discuss. But it is a great challenge for Italy”Is the opinion of Minister Franceschini.
The new Colosseum ready for 2023
To be able to admire the new Colosseum it will be necessary to wait until 2023. The light and mobile wooden roof will be isolated from the archaeological structures and can also be removed at any time, restoring the situation. Precisely because of the controversies that have arisen, Milan assured: "The structure prevents the transmission of the horizontal forces of the earthquake and the dynamic ones of the people who trample it and if one day you decide to remove the new structures it will be possible to restore the monument as it is today.". Distributed along the perimeter of the monument, there are 24 mechanical ventilation units that will control the humidity and temperature of the underground rooms.
