The received wisdom is that
the 1990 World Cup lumbered Italy a whole bunch of white
elephants: ill-conceived stadiums that prioritised form over function, that
were badly built, badly designed and then badly maintained. There is some truth
in this, but it is a truth that applies to anything and everything: shopping
malls, office blocks, warehouses, schools, leisure centres, airports, train
stations, bus stations, parks, carparks, highways, bridges, public housing,
mansions, palaces. The built environment can date very quickly, can fall apart very
quickly.
In fact,
the fate that has befallen the twelve venues that were selected for Italia ’90 is not in
any way equal. Two of the stadia no longer exist: the Stadio Delle Alpi in
Turin and the Stadio Sant'Elia in Cagliari. Stadio Friuli in Udine has been
remodelled – only the tribuna, which predated the World Cup, survives – and
Stadio Artemio Franchi in Florence is undergoing a similar process. The
condition of the remaining eight is various. Bari’s San Nicola was in a fairly
bad way but looks to have been smartened up a bit. The same can be said for
Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, but only of its interior – its exterior is
a mess. Bologna and Palermo seem to be doing ok, at least from afar, while
Genoa and Verona look to be on a gradual downward trajectory. The only grounds
that have retained their character, while still being regarded as functioning,
international venues, are Milan’s San Siro and Rome’s Stadio Olimpico. Some
will complain about the condition of the San Siro but what they’re really
griping about is the lack of corporate facilities; its general condition is
actually rather good. The condition of the Stadio Olimpico, on the other hand,
is very good.
The Stadio Olimpico was
opened in 1953, though it was conceived of in 1926. Originally known
as Stadio dei Cipressi (Stadium of the Cypress Trees), it was to be part of
a larger sports’ complex commissioned by the Opera Nazionale Balilla
(ONB), named the Foro Mussolini. A Fascist initiative, in other words.
The architect Enrico Del Debbio was given the task of realising the project, with mixed results. The Stadio dei Marmi, which is a
training facility rather than an actual stadium, appears as some sort of
neoclassical joke. The Palazzo della Farnesina, however (which was not part
of the same project but nonetheless overlooked it), exhibits signs of Italian
Rationalism. This was Fascist architecture all over, a collusion between the
modern and the ancient. In any case, Del Debbio never got to finish the job; ust a single tier of it, built into the ground. Not what modern stadia –
especially not totalitarian stadia – were made of.
Stadio
dei Cipressi was located upon an area of marshland at the bottom of Monte
Mario, which despite being the highest of all the hills in Rome is not one of
the seven that the city is known for. When it was decided to enlarge the ground
in 1937, with an eye on hosting the 1940 Summer Olympics, Debbio’s replacement,
Luigi Moretti, simply built into the hill itself, utilising the displaced soil
to raise to level the playing field by four metres. The sides of the stadium
that didn’t lean into Monte Mario were built of concrete.
There
would be no Summer Olympics in 1940, and the stadium as it was saw little in
the way of sporting action. Instead it welcomed Adolf Hitler on his state visit
to Rome in 1938, staged a military celebration of the Tripartite Pact in 1941,
and was used as a storage facility by Allied troops in 1944. After the war,
control of the stadium was handed over to the Italian National Olympic
Committee (CONI), suggesting that the idea of accommodating the Olympic Games
and never gone away. In 1951, work began on redeveloping the site, headed by the
engineer Carlo Roccatelli and architect Cesare Valle. (Annibale Vitellozzi, who
had designed Roma Termini railway station, became involved after would
Roccatelli died in 1951.)
Central
to the refurbishment was doing away with the structure’s reliance on Monte
Mario. This part of the stadium was completely demolished, the hill excavated
and a continuous tier built in its place, clad in travertine and enveloping
what remained of the old one. The pitch was countersunk by 4.5 metres to limit
the height of the stadium outside to 13 metres – it was felt that the structure
shouldn’t dominate the buildings that surrounded it, nor compete with the hill.
The Stadio dei Centomila (Stadium of the 100,000), as it was provisionally
called, actually had an official capacity of 65,000, but considering how few
seats there were it could easily hold more (at least 80,000 were present for
the Italy national team’s inaugural match against Hungary, for example). In
1960, the Olympic Games would indeed be held in Rome, by which time the stadium
was being referred to as the Stadio Olimpico. It would be another 30 years
before the ground changed in any overtly recognisable way.
If the World Cup final was
to be played in Rome then it needed a stadium worthy of the occasion, which the
Stadio Olimpico wasn't. A number of options were considered: build a new
national stadium in the EUR district south-west of the capital, expand the
Stadio Flaminio just down the road from the Stadio Olimpico, or renovate the
Stadio Olimpico. Enlarging Stadio Flaminio was quickly dismissed due to a lack
of surrounding space, while building a new stadium from scratch was deemed too
costly and too time-consuming. The Stadio Olimpico, then, would have to do.
The
problem was the criteria in place for hosting a world cup final, which included
an all-seated capacity of at least 80,000 with at least two-thirds of that to
be undercover. The Stadia Olimpico at that time had room for approximately
70,000 and no roof to speak of. Moreover, the stadium lacked a strong visual
identity, which might not have mattered but probably did, given what was happening
in Milan, Genoa, Bari, Turin.
The
solutions to the first two of these problems were relatively simple: knock down
and rebuild the curved ends to bring them closer to the action, extend the
Tever and Monte Mario grandstands to increase capacity, and put a roof over it
all. In doing this, the curvature of the end terraces, which stood some way
back from the goal-line, was reduced, bringing them 10 metres closer to the
field of play. These new curvas would be 80 rows deep, meaning that the
tribunes had to be extended by 20 rows so as to meet up with them at the top.
Once work
began, it became apparent that the Monte Mario’s foundations were in no fit state to sustain
the planned extension, and had to be demolished. It's replacement was rebuilt in a manner that more
gracefully followed the sweep of the new north and south curves, without the jarring intersections that would inflict the tribuna opposite. (It also had
the unintended but beneficial consequence of freeing up room for various
service facilities that would have otherwise been housed in temporary, external
structures.) Meanwhile, aluminium terraces supported upon lamellar wood beams
were appended to the back of the Tever – as had been planned for the Monte
Mario. The original façade was preserved, bookended by two cylindrical
stairwells wrapped around columns that also upheld the roof, the only visible
trace of the original construction.
The roof itself
was more problematic. The initial design called for eight reinforced
concrete towers with the roof suspended from it, but the Ministry of Cultural Heritage
objected, successfully, on the grounds that it would negatively impact the view
towards Monte Mario. Its replacement did away with the towers, thus maintaining
a much lower profile, and was arguably the more attractive solution anyway. Comprised
of a reticular metal frame with a triangular cross-section, it rested upon 16
columns encircling the stadium’s perimeter, four of them made of concrete – incorporating the aforementioned stairwells – the
rest steel. From the frame were attached 78 52-metre long galvanised steel
cables, rather like the spokes of a bicycle wheel, which held in place the roof
covering itself, made of a translucent glass-wool membrane coated with PTFE (the
actual name for Teflon).
A final
detail of note is the band of dark glass panels that runs around the stadium’s
exterior, pausing either side of the unadorned Tribuna Tever. It was an odd
choice for a building so beholden to the nature of its environment but isn’t
as obtrusive as it might sound, reflecting back at you the many stone pines dotted
about the area.
It has been pointed out that
the Stadio Olimpico and Stadio Diego Maradona are of a similar vintage,
although this neglects the fact that the Stadio Olimpico was almost entirely
rebuilt for the World Cup. The point still stands. Rome has never let the
situation get out of hand. It has tended to the upkeep of its stadium and to
the condition of the immediate surroundings.
Renovations carried out in 2007/08, in readiness for the Champions League final
in 2009, weren’t radical but cemented the ground’s status as UEFA 5-star venue –
darker blue seating was the most obvious change. That it was the scene for the
opening ceremony for 60th anniversary of the European Championship was no
coincidence. The European Athletics Championships were also held there in 2024.
As long as Rome continues to take care of its investment, it should continue to
hold many more such events.
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