There are lots of streets with this name in Italy, all celebrating the date on 20th September 1870 when Italian troupes stormed the Vatican’s Porta Pia thus ending the Pope’s temporal power: the final act in the Risorgimento which finally led to the unification of Italy. The Genoese street, usually referred to as Via Venti, was formally known as Via Giulia and redesigned and ‘modernised’ between 1892-1912. It is still full of art nouveau decoration, beautiful pavements, fantastic architecture and lovely colonnades… great when it’s too sunny or if it’s raining. Now there’s about 1km of shops, mostly mainstream high street chains, making it a favourite Saturday afternoon destination for the under 18s. Various schemes to pedestrianize it are regularly discussed but, being the only real thoroughfare across the city, Via Venti is destined to remain the busy, chaotic, traffic filled shopping street that it is.