Swimming in the Tiber could be possible within five years, Rome’s mayor Roberto Gualtieri has said.
Speaking at Expo 2025 in Osaka, Gualtieri called the goal “absolutely achievable” and confirmed talks with Italy’s environment minister Gilberto Pichetto Fratin and Lazio governor Francesco Rocca.
A working group has already been set up and will become interinstitutional, the mayor said. The cost is still being calculated.
Gualtieri compared the project to Paris, which reopened the Seine to swimmers this year after a €1.4 billion clean-up. Rome’s project should cost less, he said, as the Tiber’s pollution levels are lower than those faced in the French capital.
The mayor first floated the idea in July, saying he hoped to achieve it by the end of a possible second term in 2031. He identified industrial discharges into the Tiber and its tributary, the Aniene, as the main obstacles.
On Wednesday he stressed that some stretches of the river are already swimmable on certain days but added that interventions are still needed to ensure “full bathing safety” downstream of the Aniene.
Rome’s metropolitan police are now screening discharges into the tributary, including outside the city boundaries. The mayor said authorities have identified “three or four necessary actions” and, with support from experts, will set a timeline for the project. In 2021, hundreds of dead fish washed up in the Tiber.
Swimming in the Tiber was common until the 1960s when it was banned due to pollution and health risks. Today, the only legal dip comes on New Year’s Day when divers leap from Ponte Cavour into the icy waters 18 metres below.
