POPE TO INAUGURATE PARKING LOT AND NEW MUSEUM ENTRANCE

VATICAN CITY, JAN 27, 2000 (VIS) - On Monday, January 31, Pope John Paul will inaugurate the new underground parking lot for tourist busses and cars which was built on Janiculum Hill for the Jubilee Year, and a week later he will inaugurate and bless the new entrance to the Vatican Museums.

On January 31, in the presence of civil and ecclesiastical authorities, the diplomatic corps accredited to the Holy See, and representatives of the company who built the parking lot, the Holy Father will arrive by car at level "0" and take an elevator to the fifth floor. Here he will greet those present and make a speech.

Work on the new entrance to the Vatican Museums, which the Pope will inaugurate on February 7, began in mid-1997. A new entrance was deemed necessary to accommodate the ever-increasing number of visitors to the Museums, which has gone from 1.5 million annually twenty years ago to more than 3 million annually at the moment. The former entrance to the museums has become the new exit.

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