Challenges remain
Not everyone is as confident as Dr. Muscolino. Antonio Irlando, an architect and the director of the Osservatorio Patrimonio Culturale, a cultural heritage watchdog group, says that revenue from ticket sales must be supported by additional funds from the government. The conservation of Pompeii is “a duty that the government of Italy has to every Italian and to the whole world,” he said, adding that “a few years of lots of money is not enough to save Pompeii.” The focus, he stressed, must be on continual, painstaking maintenance.
One problem, Mr. Irlando claims, is that there are not enough guards to watch out for misbehavior among tourists. “Not everyone remembers that the excavations are an archaeological monument and not an amusement park,” Mr. Irlando said.
Managing tourist behavior has always been a challenge in Pompeii, an archaeological site that spans an area larger than 120 American football fields. And now tourist numbers are higher than ever. In 2009, nearly 2.1 million people visited. By 2018, that figure had risen to more than 3.6 million, an increase of more than 70 percent. This year, the number will be even higher. Nearly 450,000 people visited Pompeii in July, marking the highest monthly figure ever recorded.
And the behavior of visitors to the ancient city has long been troublesome. A small exhibition in the Antiquarium showcases stolen objects that visitors have sent back to Pompeii, claiming that the tiles, stones or figurines brought them bad luck. The new video cameras have improved surveillance, but the site is so big that plenty of areas remain unwatched.
“It is a risk. I’m glad that one third of the city is still buried,” said Glauco Messina, a licensed tour guide who added that he has seen visitors jumping barriers, picking up illicit mementos, touching frescoes, setting up tripods on fragile stone walls, and using flash photography, which can damage ancient paint. The situation isn’t helped by tourist companies that run unauthorized tours, often led by guides with uncertain qualifications.
“We’ve denounced them I don’t know how many times, but they’re still there,” Mr. Messina said of the unauthorized guides, who often lead very large groups and continue to operate in the park despite an official ban. Mr. Messina and other licensed guides — who must pass rigorous exams to earn their official “Guida Turistica” badges — warned that tourists should be wary of anyone who approaches them on the street outside the park. Tours with licensed guides can be booked inside Pompeii’s Porta Marina and Piazza Esedra entrances; official audio guides are also available inside the Porta Marina gate. Information can be found at pompeiisites.org/en/visiting-info.