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Mint
7 days ago
- Business
- Mint
Rome's Next Big Tourist Draw Risks Going Bust Before It Opens
(Bloomberg) -- The Aquarium of Rome wanted to open this year to show the millions of pilgrims and tourists flocking to the Italian capital that there's more on offer than ancient history and old churches. Instead, it's become a study in just how hard it is to deliver landmark building projects in modern times. Italian banks Intesa Sanpaolo SpA and UniCredit SpA still have a nominal interest in the struggling enterprise after being forced to write off 95% of their loan exposure to its owner in a previous restructuring. But talks to raise fresh cash from investors, including London-based distressed specialist Zetland Capital, have dragged on for years without conclusion, according to company filings seen by Bloomberg. That casts further doubt over the site's future. The location in Rome's EUR district — a neighborhood first developed in the fascist era and home to the monumental architecture popular back then — has been under construction for almost two decades, and will probably go bust if it doesn't open soon. Potential operating partners are holding off until the financing is secured. The 13,000 square-meter (139,930 square foot) project, meant to house more than 100 marine species, has already cost more than €100 million ($117 million). And it needs at least another €20 million to emerge from financial distress and finish the job, according to corporate filings. Making things worse is a drawn-out legal dispute with the EUR district authority, which is seeking damages from the site operator Mare Nostrum Romae Srl over the constant delays. 'The arrival of a new partner might be the only chance today to unblock the operation,' a spokesperson for EUR SpA, a company controlled by the Italian government that manages the area's development, wrote in a statement to Bloomberg. Representatives of Mare Nostrum and Zetland didn't respond to requests for comment. Spokespeople for Intesa and UniCredit declined to comment. The standoff and the struggle to secure new cash show how ambitious construction deals can quickly become a quagmire for providers of debt finance, especially if relations with local officials sour, creating a vicious circle of legal fears blocking the investment crucial to moving forward. While Italian courts have made progress in recent years to speed up litigation and insolvency processes, they still take longer than other top-rank economies. That's a red flag for international investors, even in distressed situations. The idea of the Rome aquarium was first dreamt up in the early 2000s, and the Ricciardis — a local family of developers — won a concession to build and run the site for 30 years. After a string of setbacks, delays and problems keeping up with its debts, their company Mare Nostrum had been seeking to open the site's doors this year to coincide with a Catholic Jubilee, a festival that's expected to attract 30 million pilgrims to Rome. It's looking ever more likely to miss out on that windfall. Negotiations with Zetland, founded by ex-HIG Capital managing director Ahmed Hamdani, hit a roadblock after it and other prospective backers asked for reassurances over an extension of Mare Nostrum's agreement to run the site that's set to expire in 2039, according to corporate filings by the Italian firm. EUR SpA has said it would be willing to grant a nine-year extension but has imposed conditions including for Mare Nostrum to tie up with firms with deeper pockets and more experience running aquariums. Costa Edutainment SpA, which operates Italy's largest aquarium in Genoa, is interested in the management of the site, once the financial issues are settled, a spokesperson told Bloomberg. Merlin Entertainments, a global manager of leisure parks and other attractions, previously retreated from a similar partnership. While Mare Nostrum cited 'positive prospects' for a legal settlement with EUR in its annual report, the lawsuit's still pending, according to EUR. There's skepticism too about the aquarium's prospects for getting started in 2025. 'It's difficult to expect an opening within the Jubilee year even with a new partner,' EUR said in its statement. --With assistance from Tiago Ramos Alfaro. More stories like this are available on
The Guardian
04-03-2025
- Automotive
- The Guardian
Cycling notes: snobbery, female riders and dispensing with a brake – archive, 1895
The increasing popularity of cycling among the 'aristocracy' is remarkable. Among recent recruits may be mentioned Lord Zetland, Lady Havelock Allan, Sir Joseph Pease, the Earl of Camperdown, the Duke of Westminster, and two of the daughters of the late Earl of Iddesleigh. Heretofore the only objection urged against the pastime has been its vulgarity. The bicycle was looked upon as the poor man's horse, and those who patronised it were considered very ordinary people. The utility of the bicycle as a means of conveyance, its capacity for causing harmless and elevating pleasure, and its undoubted health-giving qualities were all ignored at the dictates of the fashionable world. The said fashionable world have suddenly discovered the virtues of the cycle, and, ignoring the fact that even butchers' boys may derive pleasure from the same source, they have taken to it in numbers. The middle class, a large proportion of whom are born snobs, will, now that the only objection is removed, join the ranks in thousand. It will have an effect also even on those who are not snobs. Heretofore many professional and business men have been afraid to appear in public on wheels simply because it would damage them from a business point of view. I have known leading doctors who have made a practice of rising in summer at 5am, to enjoy a long ride before breakfast simply because they dared not appear in public except in the irreproachable brougham. For such as these the bar is being removed. Pneumatic saddleA paragraph for lady riders. A lady says she has found the Guthrie-Hall pneumatic saddle very satisfactory, and all of her feminine acquaintances who have tried it appear to like it too. I know a good many men who do not care for it, but that is beside the mark in the present case. I should recommend the Guthrie-Hall people to push it specially for feminine use. The use of the brake Except for absolute road-racing or record-breaking, there is nothing gained – I cannot underline this too strongly – by dispensing with a brake. From one to one and a half pound is about the weight saved, and this is not felt in ordinary riding. The diminution of labour that is undoubtedly noticed when the mud-guards are removed is due far more to the free running of the unrestricted wheel than to the small weight of those accessories themselves, and in the case of the brake there is not this excuse for removal. Its retention actually adds to the speed of the ordinary cyclist, for there are very few riders outside the ranks of the experts who care to let a machine run very fast down hill if they have no means of immediately checking its speed. It also saves much fatigue in the way of back-pedalling when long or steep hills are encountered; there is nothing more exhausting than the anxious effort to control one's machine down a steep slope that may prove too much for one's powers at any instant. Of course I do not recommend cyclists to get into the habit of constantly using the brake; it should be kept as a last resource, and only used in case of sudden necessity or danger. But the mere fact of having it there should it be required adds tremendous confidence to the nervous rider, and we are not all of us constructed after the daredevil pattern. The silly fashion of removing both guards and brake in order to imitate a road-racing class to whom the rider could not belong if he would, and possibly would not if he could, has absolutely nothing to recommend it. A lady's riding powersA correspondent who thinks of following my route through the Ribble and Lune valleys with a lady at Easter asks whether I consider the road through Gargrave to Malham too heavy with hills for a lady's average riding powers, and if decent inn accommodation is to be had at the latter place. The last time I went that way I found good accommodation at an inn at Malham, hard by Gordale Scar, but in any case there is no lack of good inns at Settle. As to taking a lady that way I should not hesitate for one moment. My experience is that the average wheel woman is quite as good at hill work as her husband or brother, since she often rides in far better style, which counts for much in hill climbing. Cycling in Hyde Park The opening of Hyde Park to cyclists under certain conditions will be a boon to London riders. They will henceforth be allowed to use it before 10 in the morning and after seven at night in 'the season,' and between the hours of 10 and four at other times of the year. This concession has been gained by the Cyclists' Touring Club, and will be announced in the approaching issue of their Gazette. I trust the time is not far distant when we in Manchester shall be strong enough to insist upon similar privileges being granted us by the Parks Committee of the Corporation. Cheap machinesOnce again I would raise my voice against cheap machines. They are dangerous to life and limb, they are heavy to drive, and they are not in reality cheap. The margin of profit to the maker of even the highest-grade machine is really small, and a reduction of one-third in price is only accomplished by the sacrifice of good material and workmanship. If riders were content with 40lb mounts they could get them cheap and sound at the same time, but with the popular weights of the day nothing but the very best material and workmanship will ensure durability. The lower the initial cost of a very light machine the dearer it will be in the end. The repair bill will be more heavy, it will become a total wreck sooner, and even when in good order the second-hand selling price will not be half as high as that of the best grade in similar condition.
