Old Athens scrubbed down in anti-graffiti campaign

One of the largest anti-graffiti campaigns in recent years has been under way in the historical center of Athens since last week.

The municipal project concerns a strip of stone wall about 200 meters long and 3 meters high that runs alongside the ISAP electric railway line connecting Monastiraki station with Thiseio.

The stone wall separates the train tracks from the archaeological site of the Ancient Agora. It has been vandalized in recent years at almost every point, making restoration work extremely difficult, combined with the fact that cleaning crews – for safety reasons – have only a few hours each night to work when there are no trains running.

So far, more than 100 liters of special solvent and several tons of water have been used to scrub clean a large section of the wall.