Bari: Mayor Vito Leccese visits the G124 project construction site.

Mayor Vito Leccese visited the construction site of the G124 project, in the San Paolo district, to verify, together with the designers and responsible technicians, the progress of the redevelopment and greening works of the Don Bosco courtyard, whose completion is expected within the year.

Jobs, of the total amount of 578.876,48 euros financed with Pon Metro 2014/20 resources, they will deliver to residents a new, completely transformed public space, characterized by the presence of 127 trees, including laurels and holm oaks.

At the center of the courtyard, which extends over a total surface area of about 5.000 sqm, a large circular clearing has been created on a flat surface that will allow the public to observe the sky: in fact, this central space has been designed for socializing, with the installation of seats, a new lighting system and the laying of stabilized draining earth. The project, in fact, aims to strengthen the relationship between the courtyard space and the houses that overlook it, building a meeting place where residents can once again recognize a sense of belonging to the neighborhood.

“This redeveloped space represents the type of intervention on public greenery that we intend to replicate in every urban void in the city – commented the mayor Vito Leccese – as it not only constitutes an important area of ​​aggregation and socialization for the residents of the area but also concretely fulfills a function of mitigating temperatures, in this case up to 6 degrees less, effectively counteracting the heat island effect. What is coming to life here, under the supervision of the architect Renzo Piano, is the first “climate refuge” in the city of Bari, a shaded place with 127 trees that will form a large green roof over the square, under which citizens will be able to find shelter and relief from the high temperatures. Furthermore, the stabilized, and therefore permeable, soil has replaced the concrete in an area of ​​5 thousand square meters, with 340 square meters designated as lawn. We are talking about an intervention of great value, consistent with the greatest challenge that awaits us all, that of combating the ongoing climate change”.

G124 was developed by the IVOP division of the Municipality of Bari with the scientific coordination of Tiziano De Venuto, Ezio Melchiorre, Rosa Piepoli and Giuseppe Tupputi, recipients of four post-graduate scholarships funded by the working group of the architect Renzo Piano and assigned to the four architects from Bari thanks to the collaboration of the professors of the Polytechnic of Bari – ArCoD department – ​​Carlo Moccia and Francesco Defilippis.