Verona. Changing the face of the city: the proposals of Italian architects on the future of the city presented.
"Quality of life, the first point in our planning" claims the Mayor.
Verona. Changing the face of the city: the proposals of Italian architects on the future of the city presented.
Urban planners, planners, university professors, professionals, businesses, Italian and foreign public administrators will discuss how the face of cities will have to change.
Mayor: “Quality of life, the first point in our planning”.
Deputy mayor and councilor for urban planning"We are working towards a Verona, shared city."
Lectio Magistralis by Carlos Moreno, pioneer of 15 minute citiesi, “redefine our development and consumption models for a safer and more sustainable future".
Wide-ranging discussion between Italian and foreign urban planners, planners, university professors, professionals, businesses and public administrators on what the face of our cities should be like in the not too distant future. It was started by the National Council of Architects, Planners, Landscape Architects and Conservators (CNAPPC) - starting from Verona, a city that launched a consultation among citizens on the Territorial Planning Plan. presenting "Project for the future - In which cities and territories do we want to live?", with a series of political proposals developed during the international conference "The future of cities - starting from the neighborhoods" held as part of Vivere Verona.
Proposals which, as explained by Massimo Crusi, President of the National Council, allow the Legislator, public administrations and public opinion to take up the theme of urban regeneration of cities and territories by imagining new ways of living, working and moving.
A new model of city – which exploded thanks to Covid-19 and the concept of proximity and which received a completely new and unexpected boost – which throughout the world is proving to be optimal for improving travel, reducing pollution, improving the economy and transforming the urban space, thanks also to a decisive role played by the care of the landscape.
An illustrated city model – in a lectio magistralis – by Carlos Moreno, professor at the Sorbonne in Paris and creator and theorist of the 15 minute city.
"Faced with growing climate, economic and energy crises – he said – the urgency to adapt our lifestyles is tangible. This adaptation passes first and foremost through a redefinition of our proximity, transforming our environments into interconnected local ecosystems where frugality is the norm and where in the meantime the local economy and social relations develop. The concept of a 15-minute city and a 30-minute territory is rooted in this logic, offering a life in which polycentrism and a more decarbonised lifestyle also promote local employment and resource consumption in a short supply chain".
"This new sustainable geography of proximity – Moreno said again – becomes a trajectory of resilience, a concrete response to visible and worsening crises. It aims to develop neighborhoods rich in interactions and quality of life, redefining our daily lives towards greater solidarity and interdependence. In this happy proximity approach, every step towards a more integrated local organization is a step towards a safer and more harmonious future for all. Extreme weather events and the continued degradation of natural resources add further urgency to this reorientation. The devastating effect of COVID-19, as well as the threat of new pandemics, heighten the need to strengthen our local resilience".
"Likewise, conflicts such as the war in Ukraine and the Middle East make the relocalization of some economic activities and greater independence of our supplies indispensable. These global challenges highlight the need to redefine our development and consumption models for a more secure and sustainable future" he concluded.
"Developing urban proximity, so that it becomes a lever for transformation, according to the guiding principles of ecology, proximity, accessibility, solidarity and participation is, for Giuseppe Cappochin, Head of the Department".
"Urban Planning Legislation and the Future of the City”, an unavoidable need. The cities of tomorrow will have to find new ways of weaving relationships between time and space, the two essential components of city life. All this to guarantee that the city, in its value as a common good, concretely represents the place where citizenship rights are realized. And the Municipality of Verona has done well to have launched, on these principles and objectives, the project to rewrite the new Territorial Planning Plan of the City".
During the conference - which will be repeated in two other Italian cities, one in the center and one in the south - the objectives of the Memorandum of Understanding recently signed between the CNAPPC and the Department for Regional Affairs were also presented on these topics and the Autonomies (DARA) of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers.
"The issue of the quality of life in the city should, and often is not in fact, the first point in urban planning - declares the mayor –. The vision of the city and its urban plan is repeatedly seen according to needs and with often private investments without an organic vision of the common good. Care, care of the city as a whole is instead one of the founding points on which this Administration intends to work. To do this, we must first carry out a listening phase, with the collection of requests and sensitivities. A phase that tries to reach in the most widespread way possible the perceptions that do not usually emerge and which probably have no place to express themselves.
Do you need to be technical or political? - asks the mayor of Verona - We must hope that all specialists who have delegations in an administration have a political vision of their role and feel a responsibility in this sense.
What is certain is that if choices are carried out always and only on the basis of feedback from the electorate, there is a risk that things will no longer move forward or that they will only be carried forward by those who do not think about electoral confrontation.
The instinct is to chase consensus through immediate feedback, with the fear of stopping at the first comment or without knowing how to dialogue with worlds that may be problematic but which need to be taken into account. Complex designs that are able to provide far-sighted answers require long times".
"A very important initiative indeed – underlines the deputy mayor and councilor for urban planning – the result of a process that began a year and a half ago, in October 2022. What we are pursuing in Verona is an urban planning vision that places women, children, the elderly, people with disabilities of all kinds and, in particular, at the centre. young people. The future belongs to them, who are among the subjects to whom our attention is directed, carried out primarily by listening to citizens. I take this opportunity to recall the content of a wonderful and significant book, that of Elena Granata: 'The meaning of women for the city', a journey through female thought that becomes practical through architects, urban planners, planners, but also philosophers , sociologist, writers, journalists, who have dealt with cities, examining the terms of proximity and habitability of public spaces in search of new parities and reciprocities. Among the points to note is the decalogue to arrive at a shared city, or rather the shared city that we aim to have in Verona. The subtitles of the chapters of this decalogue have in fact become the trace of the new urban planning vision that we are pursuing. Or rather that 'The city is made up of people and relationships'. That we must 'Learn from places and landscapes'. 'Working on the hybrid and open nature of spaces'. 'Starting again from the body and its habits'. 'Promote what has value, but is priceless'. Establish 'The relationship between the various senses'. 'Building a new city for all'. 'Changing the way we talk about places'. 'Looking for the vital spirit of places'. 'Thinking the city in an ecological way'.
“Among the main objectives of this Administration – specifies the deputy mayor and councilor for urban planning – there is the implementation of general urban planning tools, in consideration of the fact that Verona has a Territorial Planning Plan – PAT of 2004/2007 and an Intervention Plan – PI of 2011. To carry forward this review, steps have been taken to strengthen the municipal structure with a multidisciplinary working group, which for each evaluation started from incontrovertible scientific data in addition to the activation, never carried out before, of a participatory discussion with the citizens. In fact, for the first time, the working group includes participation experts and transport experts. The latter because we believe that one of the city's main problems is mobility, still too centered on the car, which must be taken out of the neighborhoods, which are today too clogged with traffic. The natural and monumental infrastructures of the city must then be valorised. Specifically, the infrastructures: Blue – the river; Green – the parks; Monumental, which includes 100 hectares of territory made up of the masterly walls which we aim to make become a hinge between the neighbourhoods, in a sort of large green park. Then there are the Housing Policies, which push for social construction, with public and private partnerships".
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