Inclusiveness of Public Space: Experimental Approaches for the Revitalisation of Smaller Historic Urban Centres

Abstract: In recent decades, many small Italian historic centers—particularly those situated inland—have witnessed a population decline due to inadequate access to public services and facilities. However, this depopulation has also allowed many centers to retain their distinctive features, now conferring upon them great cultural–historical and landscape value. New quality-of-life-centered economic models present the development of accessible public services as a necessity. Such a process could catalyze the recovery and growth of these centers, which continue to be deserted, regardless of their value. This paper considers combined solutions, including sustainable mobility, digital accessibility, networked services, and technological devices by applying them to trans-scalar studies with the goal of achieving sustainable outcomes. Some of the proposed solutions are the resolution of irregular ground levels, the use of electric vehicles, the creation of sharing models, the physical overhaul of routes, and the retrofitting of minor buildings for inclusive use in a comprehensive human-centered approach toward regeneration. This study is in line with the European guidelines for sustainable and intelligent mobility, whose goal is for at least one hundred European cities to become accessible to all and shifted to zero-emission mobility. Here, sustainable and smart mobility is understood not only as an improvement of environmental and social conditions, but also as a catalyst for environmental and social improvements and as an opportunity to enhance the livability of smaller, geographically isolated historic centers, moving toward a new economy of urban reclamation

Circular Water Management in Public Space—Experimental Feasibility Studies in Different Urban Contexts

Several studies highlight the risks related to the growing water crisis, worsened by the effects of pollution, which increasingly make water sources non-potable. The current water-sensitive urban design (WSUD) approach improves resource efficiency and implements urban livability by combining natural water flows with all the scales of the urban landscape. The logistic and operational management of water disposal/treatment and distribution requires performing service design ac- cording to cities’ physical and morphological features, starting from their architectural and landscape characteristics. This paper aims to prove that different landscapes can offer different inspirations and possibilities to imagine a WSUD-coherent system, fulfilling the integration requirements with the urban system. For this purpose, three case studies, differing by dimension, morphology, and urban typology, are analyzed, experimenting with circular water usage with no resource waste. This research proposes concrete actions such as conservation, restoration or addition of permeable surfaces, the installation of new accumulation and treatment systems, and the use of water-saving devices. Starting from redesigning the water system, they can also include punctual redevelopment inter- ventions on the urban built environments and opportunities for network development with public administrations, private businesses, third-sector organizations, and end users. This experimentation has led to water savings of up to 80% of the current consumption scenario

Vulnerabilità sismica e sicurezza degli edifici.Controllo prestazionale degli elementi non strutturali

La qualità delle opere di architettura ed i caratteri specifici e funzionali degli ediifici si esplicano attraverso l’offerta prestazionale anche e soprattutto degli elementi non-strutturali del sistema edilizio, che hanno per caratteristiche costruttive, specialmente nei sistemi intelaiati, ruoli, compiti e morfologie autonomi, quantunque integrati, dalle membrature strutturali. Il decremento di questa offerta prestazionale tende a coincidere con la perdita di efficienza dell’intero sistema. L’evento sismico, per le caratteristiche di intenso ed istantaneo stress meccanico, produce sugli elementi non-strutturali notevoli danni che potrebbero essere evitati o contenuti con una più attenta e completa progettazione e successiva realizzazione, al pari di ciò che avviene per gli elementi strutturali. Questo testo, facendo seguito a pochi isolati episodi di anni or sono, intende offrire qualche nota, per una cultura integrata della qualità e della prevenzione, che attribuisca un ruolo all’integrità ed alla sicurezza non-strutturale ed impiantistica, con l’auspicio che l’investimento in tal senso raggiunga, anche in Italia, i livelli di attenzione e trattazione più opportuni. Ciò che si propone è frutto di una prima fase di tentativi di messa a punto di tecniche e magisteri specifici nati da: l’individuazione degli elementi non-strutturali, delle loro specificità edilizie, delle loro prestazioni e vulnerabilità, e dei danni che possono presentare a seguito di un evento sismico; l’uso di materiali e tecniche già presenti nel mercato ed utilizzati per fini differenti ma, comunque, testati nell’affidabilità, con processi di mutuazione dalle prassi consolidate; l’interpolazione di tecniche tradizionali ed innovative che può produrre soluzioni tecniche ed espedienti i quali, pur dopo una necessaria verifica di laboratorio, possano incrementare l’affidabilità dell’edificato contemporaneo e moderno e scongiurare sempre più non già l’evento sismico, ma i suoi effetti

Progettazione tecnologica della citt\ue0 e paesaggio urbano nella gestione dei rifiuti. Circolarit\ue0 dei processi per un nuovo metabolismo

When considering the problems due to the increase of Municipal Solid Waste and its disposal, it becomes clear that the latest European directives have drawn greater attention on this issue directing disposal strategies towards circular economy and zero impact. Research innovation mainly lies in the strategic and methodological aspects outlining a trend reversal by turning technological innovations into effective actions and solutions that are compatible with urban and environmental heritage so to allow their preservation and recovery as well as their implementation. Starting from the discretization of the logistic problem and from the recovery and technological retrofitting requirements of urban services in open spaces and buildings - with the instrumental use of well-known innovative technologies - this study proposes practical actions characterised by administrative, technical and economic feasibility. Such actions can be achieved through accurate sustainable and innovative regeneration interventions on infrastructure and spaces of existing towns as well as through opportunities of social participation and development building networks with the public administration, enterprises, the service industry, and users. In an age of huge crisis of resources, and at the same time of strong environmental awareness, where the waste issue represents a pressing problem, often an emergency, it is still possible to collect cash flows to solve the problem offering new opportunities for the town physical recovery and for social and occupational development, with all the consequent advantages. Like in the most renowned international cases, those strategies can address the service issue and increase their positive effects in terms of residential, tourism and financial attractiveness. At this point, it is clear that as far as waste disposal is concerned, communities must be self-sufficient; it is necessary to: increase the value of waste through the production of secondary raw materials and energy; create intervention models and strategies that can be reproducible and/or easy to re-modulate; underline the interdependence between sustainable development, safeguard of resources and employment

Centri a forte connotazione nell'entroterra dell'Italia meridionale: ripensare la città tra valori, vincoli fisici e opportunità tecnologiche

The hinterland of central and southern Italy and the Islands is interspersed with mostly neglected architectural and urban heritage. These territories present many infrastructural, orographic, and economic constraints. A survival economy had survived, strongly tied to their productive, physical, and cultural identity. New models of the economy (sustainable, responsible, circular, green, sharing, and low-cost models) and new instances in the field of architecture and urban planning (accessible and inclusive spaces built for people) are certainly more appropriate for the reinterpretation of towns with a strong historical connotation: their characteristics are closer to a culture of quality, identity, slowness, without renouncing centrality, something that digital and internet connections allow despite the physical distance. A careful study of these places shows the recurrence of considerable constraints that can no longer be considered impossible. New technologies (digital, domotic, wireless, urban vehicle concepts, etc.) and the 4.0 revolution in the industrial field, which implies the use of enabling technologies, none of which requires physical proximity, support us in the study of specific compatible solutions for the reuse of urban and building heritage