TRIESTE. The Eastern Adriatic Sea Port System Authority and the Region are working on a shared path to start the restoration of the historic Ausonia bathing establishment, including the Olympic swimming pool closed since 2019 following a storm.
After a technical evaluation of the situation and the needs for intervention on the property, the Authority has started the design activity, valued at approximately 100 thousand euros, which will include the preliminary feasibility study and the further components, dedicated respectively to the general aspects of the structures, the walkways on the sea side and customs side, the consolidation and reconstruction of the steps of the pool and the consolidation of the attic. Having a qualified restoration project, which will be shared with the Fvg Superintendence in view of the necessary final approval, constitutes the prerequisite for the institutions, and primarily the Region, to be able to find – in particular through the ministries responsible for the protection and valorisation of cultural heritage – the funds estimated at approximately 2 million euros, necessary to actually start with the intervention.
The Ausonia bathing establishment, in concession to the Ausonia cooperative social non-profit Consortium, and protected by the Ministry of Culture, was also the subject of attention by representatives of associations and citizens who had moved with petitions for the restoration, addressed in particular to the ministry of Culture. Requests to obtain funds had already been forwarded to the ministry previously, but the lack of an adequate planning and approval procedure had effectively closed the possibilities of starting financing paths.
The president of the ports of Trieste and Monfalcone Zeno D’Agostino, in his role as state manager of the historic bathing establishment, states that «the availability of a project and the collaboration with the Region’s Infrastructure Department are the best conditions for achieving the important objective of channeling the resources necessary for the restoration of the Ausonia in the future, also trusting in the support of the Ministry of Culture which has always demonstrated, also through the Superintendency, great sensitivity and openness to collaboration”. The regional councilor for Infrastructure Cristina Amirante declares that «the stimulus of the majority in the Regional Council on the topic of the recovery of the historic Ausonia bathing establishment immediately found me in agreement on the need to proceed as soon as possible with a project, to avoid the neglect dictated by time and atmospheric agents take over”.
