Roman Junkyards

How do you dispose of an old scooter (moto, or scooter) or car (macchina) that has seen its better days? We faced that problem not so long ago, when our 4-cycle Piaggio Hexagon 150 died on via Cristoforo Colombo. We called the rottamazione (wrecker) guy and--well, that's a story for another post. In retrospect, we might have been better off to follow one of the "folk" remedies favored by Romans.

Foremost among these is to remove the plates and leave the vehicle where it is. It will soon be stripped for spare parts and the carcass left to rust. We offer as an example this forlorn skelton, chained to a post in Piazzale Cardinal Corsalvi, just off Ponte Milvio in Flaminio. We took the picture in 2008, but we'll bet the remains are still there.













A car without plates could attract the attention of the polizia, so disposing of automobiles is more difficult--but not much. In this case, the burial ground is the Roman campagna, the countryside, and especially the nearby Colli Albani (Alban Hills), where any vine-covered ravine (or anywhere, really) is a disposal site. We came across the specimens in this post while hiking. It almost makes you want to get a rustbucket just so you can have the fun of finding a good resting place for it in the woods. Or, as the joyful young men who made this video did, just take it out to a field and roll it over. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nEDbOrO0XD8 (Very Appalachian, as the music suggests).

Bill