Access Management to the Eastern Gate of Philippopolis – the New Archaeological Jewel of Plovdiv ( Plovdiv, Bulgaria )

The new archaeological jewel of Plovdiv

In the autumn of 2024 in Plovdiv opened its doors to visitors the new jewel in the archaeological heritage of the city of Plovdiv.

These are two ancient sites in Plovdiv that are becoming among the major tourist attractions of Bulgaria’s second city. Nebet Tepe, also called the Acropolis of Philippopolis, and the Eastern Gate are the places that will attract both tourists and the interest of archaeologists and historians.

The restoration of the archaeological sites has taken years, going through complex coordination, archaeological surveys and restoration works.
As of today, the East Gate has officially started welcoming tourists. It is located at the foot of the Trihill and is a visual textbook of Archaeology. Here, artifacts are preserved and exquisitely exposed as layers of interest from the Hellenistic and Roman eras are traced.

The road to Constantinople passed from here. The gate itself is the main central entrance of the ancient city. The 13-metre-high Eastern Gate connected the harbour to the Hebros River, today’s Maritsa, which was navigable in those times. It functioned during the reigns of the emperors Marcus Aurelius and Lucius.

Man-management through massive turnstiles

It was the controlled access to the East Gate of Philippopolis that was assigned as a task to VAiOS by the main contractor – GBS-Plovdiv.

Together we found the most appropriate way to build a passage regime by means of massive turnstiles at the two approaches to the archaeological site.

To secure the dynamic weather conditions we chose to install solid stainless steel double-pass turnstiles. Controlled access was supplemented by VAiOS V15 series readers, which are also characterised by their high moisture, dust and impact resistance.