On May 1, it was announced that the state would allocate 100 million euro to complete Florence.
Florence skyline – ph. ©2016 Helen Farrell / The Florentine
The designation was part of a larger budgetary decision made during a Sunday meeting of the government in Rome, during which 1 billion euro was assigned to culture and 2.5 billion to innovation and research.
The following day, at the recently reopened Teatro Niccolini, Italian prime minister Matteo Renzi announced 60 million euro would be allocated toward completing Florence’s Teatro dell’Opera and another 40 million toward finishing the Grandi Uffizi project.
The funds for the opera house will be used to complete the underground part of the fly tower, enabling the theatre to manage up to three sets at the same time, changing them at the touch of a button, and to complete work on the 1,000-seat auditorium, artists’ dressing rooms and the parking area.
It is hoped that the 40 million euro earmarked for the Uffizi will prove enough to complete the work and remove the cranes, erected in 2006, from the city’s skyline.
