Rome’s Contemporary Past - Global Rome: Changing Faces of the Eternal City - page 170

are “themselves part of Rome's history and sections should perhaps be left intact
to commemorate the character of the city in the first three decades of the 20th
century” (packer 1989, 141).
if the 1980s were dominated by the aborted archaeological park, during the
1990s, it was the preparations for the Jubilee of 2000 that took center stage. The
plans were somewhat complicated by the fact that this was, primarily, a religious
celebration and the timing and scale of events depended on the Vatican.3 fran-
cesco Rutelli, who was the mayor of Rome in the run-up to the Jubilee, had high
hopes for what could be achieved:
Rome hopes to offer visitors from all over the world an avant-garde metropolis
with the ability to combine the patrimony of its glorious past with an im-
proved quality of life, a modern and compatible infrastructure, efficient ser-
vices and cultural stimuli. (Quoted in Kirk 2005, 253.)
sadly the reality fell far short of this ideal. secular authorities focused their
activities on museums and areas around the main Christian basilicas: the inabil-
ity to tackle transportation infrastructure in any meaningful way was noted as a
weakness (scoppola 1998, 46, 54). even more problematical were the controver-
sies caused by the building of a multistory car park near saint peter's basilica and
the construction of a complex of new musical auditoria in the northern suburbs
(parco della musica) which were originally intended to be opened in 2000.
The car park for the anticipated influx of pilgrims to saint peter's was exca-
vated into the adjacent Gianicolo hill. The designated area was in the grounds
of a pontifical institute and therefore came under the jurisdiction of the Vatican,
making it exempt from italian heritage laws. Rumors began to circulate that a
Roman villa and even possibly early Christian tombs had been destroyed in the
course of its construction. These rumors appeared to be confirmed when Ro-
man artifacts were found on the spoil heaps. The italian archaeological super-
intendency became involved when it was discovered that the ramps for the car
park were on italian, not Vatican, land. some cursory excavation was carried
out, but the damage had already been done and the car park was well behind
schedule by this stage. There was little political will to push for the kind of ex-
pensive and time-consuming excavation that would have been required, even if
the legal issues of land ownership could have been resolved. The prospect of tens
of millions of pilgrims arriving with no parking facilities available was simply
unconscionable.
another reason why the archaeological superintendency was probably re-
luctant to take on the Vatican was that it already had its hands full with issues
concerning the parco della musica. This was a prestigious project of three concert
halls by the world famous architect Renzo piano whose design was intended to
be a contemporary evocation of Roman architecture. unfortunately for him, Ro-