Green infrastructure for the landscape reconfiguration of the VII Municipio of Roma: an open project, beyond urban regeneration

The paper returns the results of research work, both applied and theoretical, concerning the reconfiguration of the city planning and landscaping of the VII Municipio of Rome. This is achieved through the use of green and blue infrastructure. The proposition gives answers to the need to give value to the “landscape system” as an urban structure for cities more sustainable, liveable and resilient to the impact of climate change. The study proposes scenarios through the reading of the physical/ natural elements and the anthropic, historic and contemporary, that at one time marked and today define the structure of one of the most populous neighbourhood of the city. The methodology founded on a multiple systems approach, multi-scalars, an in depth investigation of the historic archives and direct and detailed knowledge of the Municipio took into examination three principle macrocategories: a) the park system and of the areas next to aqueducts and railways; b) main connection axis; c) three linear identity and historical testimony elements. The critical issues which emerged are reinterpreted in propositions of short/medium/long timescales that integrate the programmes of the institutions, the requirements of the citizenship and in depth botanical study. The theoretical investigation has been the basis for a proposal of scenarios that give back the “landscape system” as a scheme which is composed of interconnected infrastructure that constitutes itself as an open project for the entire territory. The reconfiguration of the landscape joins together and implements the green infrastructure of the Municipio by activating processes of social inclusion and new public spaces. The scenarios answer to both the implicit and explicit questions of the territory prospecting forms and uses, even temporary-experimental, in areas and property where the citizenship become co-designers of the process and of the regeneration of their daily life space.