Muzzerone Parete Centrale climbing ban

As of 6/08/2014 the Comune di Porto Venere (La Spezia) has prohibited climbing on and access to Parete Centrale, Monte Muzzerone.
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Muzzerone central crag
Davide Battistella
A few days ago the Porto Venere town council banned climbing at its beautiful Muzzerone Parete Centrale crag. This ban follows a geological survey and affects this crag only. We hope the ban is temporary seeing that the town council itself has stated it will intervene as soon as possible to reopen this crag to climbing. To do this though constructive dialogue will be needed in order to create a concrete project shared by all those concerned. The press release of the local climbing association Blu Verticale provides details.


MUZZERONE PARETE CENTRALE CLIMBING BAN


Following a geological survey aimed at ''investigating'' the stability of the crag, the commune of Portovenere has prohibited climbing on and access to the Parete Centrale... as it plans on "carrying out works that lead to the use of the area compatible with the risks associated with free climbing''...

We reserve the right to evaluate this situation carefully during the next few days and, if necessary, intervene as appropriate.

The Blu Vertical association underlines its bewilderment and bitterness with regard to the fact that this was a totally one-sided decision, taken without any dialogue with the local associations who - for one reason or another – deal with the Muzzerone crags.

While the idea of ensuring safety is certainly commendable, how the Park and the Portovenere Commune have acted is far less so, seeing that they seem capable only of prohibiting and banning instead of coming up with a constructive plan. The result is that thousand of people can no longer enjoy one of the most beautiful and most popular public areas not only in Italy, but worldwide.

While it is certain that the crag needed checking and rebolting, it is surprising that this urgent need for safety has been passed only now by the town council for the Parete Centrale, a cliff on which people have climbed on for forty years without any risk of falling stones, while entire sections of paths walked by thousands of people every year are exposed to far greater risks.

This seemed to work qualification having to carry forward comparing to, for issues related to the history of climbing and the protection of historic routes with various local associations, but we can not fail to note that to date has prevented - for some years now - with order of the intervention of riveting and bolting without this being below any other intervention (with the result of a progressive deterioration of safety) and today it prohibits access without any design known to date of intervention.

We hope that the above premise to "intervene as soon as possible" does not lead to an indefinite closure of the Parete Centrale, as was the case with the planned rebolting of the crag, even if the absolute absence of dialogue, concrete projects and allocated financial resources indicate that there are dark days ahead for climbing in this area.

Blu Vertical will carefully observe the events as they unfold and publish, on its website and via the media, any delays and territorial management that slows down the process of restoring this priceless landscape, environment and culture to the climbing community.

Associazione Blu Verticale





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