6533b826fe1ef96bd1283de4

RESEARCH PRODUCT

Re-build landscape. Design for the reuse of abandoned quarries

subject

description

Looking at the history of our geological and mining heritage, we can see the evolution of the role played by underground mining sites over the centuries. However, if the activity of quarrying stones is as old as the presence of humans on earth, the issue of the territorial regeneration, based on the recovery and re-functionalization of abandoned quarries, is one of the central arguments of the contemporary debate. The extractive activity that on one hand constitutes an important economic resource for numerous territories, on the other hand requires particular attention to the environmental impact it causes. The theme is that of the so-called drosscapes, soils and residual spaces, once marginal and peripheral in relation to the cities, which today occupy interstitial positions and often central locations within the urban and peri-urban tissues, covering a decisive role in the activation of processes aimed at the overall rebalancing of the affected contexts [1, 2]. The considerable number and extent of the formerly extractive cunicular systems, underneath our urbanized grounds, makes the issue of their protection, recovery and reuse extremely urgent (together with their consolidation in the cases in which it is necessary). Today, the need for a balanced development of the territory compares with the theme of planning which involves many figures coming from different disciplines: geologists, botanists, architects, landscapers, designers and artists. The figure of the designer moves in this interconnected multidisciplinary context, describing new operational practices, in which the now stable involvement of the citizen gives rise to new inclusive and fruitful practices of participatory planning. Emphasizing the relational vocation of design, as a discipline, questions are asked about what role design can play in the dialogue with the various subjects involved. One wonders what it means for the designer to create the devices of relationship and involvement of the actors at the various scales of the landscape; to translate the desires and requests of the inhabitants into space, but also the public and private interests of the other stakeholders present, working towards the definition of a shared language; to encourage the communities to look after their daily landscape. The article, through the support of some emblematic case studies, describes some procedural lines of intervention that outline new strategies for the re-use and recovery of quarry landscapes. These, no longer perceived as “wounds” and “places of refusal”, are stabilized as territorial resources, common goods to be valued through the recognition of the underlying value and a deep comprehension of these resources. The article identifies, through the projects examined, processes constituted by minimal but significant intervention. These processes respond to the desire for simplicity, that reads (and responds to) complexity and contradictions [3, 4] present in these landscapes, which are events rich of high anthropological, architectural, urban, historical and cultural value.