The Rome city council will soon begin a complicated move in which 5,000 employees will be transferred into premises in the Ostiense area. Six council departments, currently in offices all over the city, will come under one roof in a building that was once shared by the British American Tobacco company and the Italian state tobacco monopoly. In turn the offices being vacated will be occupied by other council departments or will be put to new use.

Two of the buildings being vacated are destined to become museums. The first, in the Orangery at the Villa Borghese, is due to open in spring 2006 and will display the Bilotti Collection, 20 paintings by Giorgio de Chirico that have been offered to the city by Carlo Bilotti, an Italian-born American and a famous contemporary art collector. The second museum, in a large palazzo in the Via dei Cerchi, will be dedicated to ancient Rome, combining the Museum of Roman Civilization, which is now in EUR, and a large collection of Roman antiquities, not currently on display.

When these moves have been completed, the city council plans to put costumes and sets from the Rome Opera house on display at EUR, in the building that is at present home to the Museum of Roman Civilization.