Lilac Time

If you cast your mind back to when this interminable voyage round Milan began, I decided to do the five lines in numerical order, because I'm boring and a bit predictable.  With the M1 and the M2 largely done, my spreadsheet was clear for day three: complete the Gessate branch, then move on to complete the M3 from start to finish.  A long day, to be sure, but worth it.

The first two days were making me rethink my approach.  I really hadn't taken into account how hot it would be.  The whole of Europe was sweltering under nightmarish, sweltering conditions, and as a fat middle aged man who walks very quickly, I was finding myself both exhausted and sweaty.  My clothes from the first day on the network were still damp two days later, hung in my air conditioned hotel room; meanwhile I'd got used to my pee being thick treacle from the dehydration.

Waking up to a severe weather alert, with predicted temperatures reaching the high thirties, filled me with terror.  I really didn't want to flake out in the middle of the street (I once fainted in the heat at school and it's given me a lifetime stress about it happening again).  A hospital visit would be terrible, not least because I only had a week in Milan and all those stations still to collect.

I changed my plans.  Instead of the M2 and M3, which would take me out all day, I'd do the M5: a much smaller line which, with any luck, I could polish off before the afternoon heat really took hold.  

The other advantage of going to the M5 early was its radically different architecture.  The line opened in 2015 (before the M4, oddly), and twenty-odd years after the M3.  It means it benefits from many of the subsequent advances in metro technology: driverless trains, platform-edge doors, integrated disabled access.

I got off the train at San Siro Stadio and immediately grinned.  One of my main complaints about the Milan Metro is every station is more or less the same; you can only tell where you are by reading the name on the signboards.  It's economy of scale when it comes to the design and building process, yes, but I felt it was also a missed opportunity for small points of differentiation.  It doesn't have to be elaborate architectural variations, it could be something simple and small.

Something like, for example, unique tiled artwork at each station.  This is what the Tube did with the Victoria Line in the Sixties, and seeing a tiled design at San Siro Stadio delighted me.  It seemed the M5 had a similar idea.  I looked forward to cataloguing them.

I went up to the surface.  There are two exits to the station.  One is open for regular, day to day transportation.  It's a sub-surface ticket hall, escalators, and exits to the street.

The other entrance is, basically, a massive funnel, ready for match days at the stadium that gives it its name.  Automatic turnstiles here hold back the crowds until the platforms are cleared, regulating the passenger numbers and stopping overcrowding. 

The San Siro is, of course, one of the most famous football stadiums in the world, the home of both AC and Inter Milan, in another of those perfectly reasonable groundshares that are common in Europe but would result in some kind of interurban warfare in the UK.  There was a brief period where it was suggested Liverpool and Everton should share a brand new stadium and I genuinely think both teams would've rather shared with Manchester United than one another.

The stadium has existed on this site since the 1930s, gaining new tiers and extensions as the decades went on, with its newest most famous ring coming in time for Italia '90.  That was the one that gave it the distinctive spiral entrances, plus the gridded roof struts above.  

It's also, weirdly, my fourth Olympic stadium on a foreign metro trip in a row, though only on a technicality; the opening ceremony of the 2026 Winter Olympics was held here, but no actual events, what with it being a football stadium and all.

The San Siro's days are numbered now.  Inter and AC bought it off the city last year with plans to build an entirely new stadium next door.  There used to be a velodrome and indoor arena there, built in 1976, but during heavy snowfall in 1985 the roof collapsed.  It was subsequently demolished and has left a nice open area which means the two football teams can construct a replacement without interfering with matches at the existing ground.

They've been rather quiet on what their actual plans for the site are; earlier this year some old ticket offices were knocked down, causing the city to query if they were starting work before they'd got permission.  Approval for the new stadium isn't planned until next year, but they'll have to get a move on to put it together, as Italy will be hosting the Euros in 2032 and need it ready for then.  (Italy are co-hosting it with... Türkiye.  How is it that as we're trying to discourage unnecessary air travel sporting events are being hosted across multiple countries that aren't even neighbours?  Good luck following your team from Turin to İzmir and back again).  

Incidentally, I sent the BF a picture of the San Siro, thinking that, as a football fan, he might appreciate it.  He replied with the following message:

Sporting types: they're basically children.

The various concrete barriers around the San Siro had been graffitied by the various "Ultras" and were decorated with messages in Italian that I'm sure weren't at all flattering.  This one I could understand, though because I'm a Massive Gay, my immediate thought was of iconic Italian movie star Claudia Cardinale, and not, as it turns out, the American chair of the private equity firm that owns AC Milan.

There's another potential building site further along the Via dei Rospigliosi.  This was the site for Milan's trotting racecourse (better known as harness racing in the UK).  That moved to a newer site at La Maura, leaving a large expanse ripe for exploitation.

Unfortunately for the developers, the land has come with all sorts of conditions; the stable blocks, for example, are listed and have to be preserved, while the city has insisted on half the space being used for greenery and public areas.  As a result the area is only now getting underway as a future site for apartments and shops - helped, no doubt, by the metro on its doorstep.

The next station was San Siro Ippodromo, which doesn't sound like real Italian.  It sounds like something Captain Bertorelli from 'Allo 'Allo would say.  "I took-a these beyoootiful laydies to-a the Ippodromo!  What a mistake-a to make-a!"  Obviously I know we took the word "hippodrome" from them, and that here it's referring to the racetrack, but it still sounds a little bit too comic.

That definitely says San Siro Ippodromo, by the way.  The designers went arty for some of the entrances to the M5, with these steel awnings with the name laser cut into it.  I'm sure it looks fantastic at night, lit from behind, but on a bright morning you have to squint to see it.

Ippodromo's tiled alcove?  This fetching shade of green that absolutely clashes with the lilac of the line colour.  Segesta, meanwhile, is grey.

Neither has what experts would call a "design feature" like San Siro Stadio though.  And that was only some writing.  Perhaps my excitement was premature.

You'll also notice I managed to come out without my stupid little hat as well.  Another reason why I needed to get back before the heat started burning the top of my head.

The M5 intersects with the M1 at Lotto, which you might remember I got a couple of days before, and so I skipped that one and walked across town.  I passed the Popeye's which had annoyed me back then, this time crossing instead of walking alongside, and got annoyed by it again.  Still, it could be worse: Liverpool is soon to get a branch of notoriously homophobic fried food merchant Chick-Fil-A.  Do better, Liverpool.

This part of the city was experiencing a rapid and radical upswing in fortunes.  For many years it was home to the main exhibition centre, until most of it moved out to the end of the M1.  There are still a couple of halls left here but the majority of the site has been given over to regeneration.

The end of the old exhibition centre has been enlivened by the addition of The Comet, a mass of LED-lit metal that writhes its way over the otherwise boring boxes.  It's also home to the Allianz MiCo, a convention centre.

I threaded my way through the many lanes of traffic and across to Portello station, hidden beneath the high walls.

Down at the platform, I stopped to take in the next piece of alcove tiling.  Perhaps it could fill me with hope that there was a whole world of art ahead of me?

Oh.