The tourists' gaze is lost between the large arch, which dominates the entire building, and the breathtaking panorama that opens onto the city. The enormous beauty distracts from what you see next door: the usual broken benches, the plexiglass once again broken or filled with spray-on writing. Along the fortification there is also garbage, daily traces of passages of people consuming drinks and food. And they leave their leftovers there. That's not enough, there is an endless construction site for the restoration work on the Hypogeum, that slide-shaped concrete monster (in via De Candia) and, since yesterday, for a few days, the Covered Walk has also been closed due to a fall of rubble. Despite having resisted the bombs of '43, it has long had to face the effects of vandals and uncivilized people who have been stopping on the terrace of Saint Remy for at least ten years. The Bastion looks like a wounded and unarmed soldier. «We have taken steps to clean up the Bastione ramp, which had been unseemly for years», the one that overlooks via De Candia, so to speak, says the mayor Massimo Zedda . Furthermore, «we had a meeting with the Superintendency who asked us to present a project for the Bastion», he adds.
The relaunch
The Municipality, therefore, is preparing to launch its strategy to restore the dignity it deserves to the most important monument in the city. «The first thing to do is to complete the work on the terrace of Santa Caterina», gutted since 2009, and the protagonist of redevelopment works which proceeded in fits and starts and slowed down first by Covid, then by the cost of steel which quadrupled, then finally by the archaeological finds at beginning of the year, therefore, «reopen the historic café on the Bastione, in the space owned by the Municipality», says Mayor Zedda. «With regards to this last issue», he adds, «it will be necessary to evaluate whether to include security in the tender, a service that will also be necessary for the refreshment area in the Gardens under the Walls and inside the Covered Walk during events».
The closure of the historic bar, or rather the failure to renew the concession which expired two years ago by the previous administration, was one of the reasons for discussion. Among those who thought that without that activity the Umberto I terrace would be taken hostage by decay and the old administration, in fact, who imagined an info point in that space as part of a broader redevelopment project.
Jobs
The administration, as mentioned, has already met with the Superintendency to discuss the future of the Bastion: while waiting for the overall project, we begin to discuss what can (and must) be done immediately. «Conclude the restoration work on the Hypogeum as soon as possible», reiterates Yuri Marcialis, councilor for urban infrastructure . «In the meeting with the Superintendence we also discussed to understand if there was the possibility of making the excavation visible but the glare of the light would impede the view. For this reason we will conclude the work and then other solutions will be evaluated", he adds. But then we have to work on the marble benches and decide what to do with the plexiglass, which the previous administration cleaned of writing, placed to make the monument safe. In the field there were other hypotheses, in addition to cleaning: a handrail all around with braille writing, the arrangement of planters one meter away from the wall, a protective net attached to the walls. «We will think to understand what to do», concludes councilor Marcialis, «our intention, however, is to launch a competition of ideas».
(Unioneonline)