Rome
Roman officials said this week they would begin paving some of the city’s ancient cobblestone streets. As cars and trucks bump along the cobblestone streets, they cause the roads to vibrate. These vibrations have begun damaging nearby ancient monuments and Renaissance palaces, officials said, adding that they had to put the preservation of the buildings before that of the roadways. “It’s difficult to find a balance in protecting the city’s landscape,” Maurizio Galletti of the Culture Ministry said. Smooth asphalt roads will also be much cheaper to maintain. Repairing cobblestone streets is a dying art, and Rome now has only eight masons trained to hammer replacement stones into place.
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