Rethinking disused places and spaces, to transform the city and give new life to spaces. This was discussed at the Trento Festival of Economics in the panel “Regenerating places to regenerate communities: the care of common goods as a tool for participation”.
On the participatory path of Super Trento, which will lead to the design of the surface freed by the burial of the tracks between Scalo Filzi and Muse, spoke Teresa Pedretti, partner of the Collettivo Campomarzio. “Administrations and citizens must begin to think that the very processes of creation and collaboration of common goods can already be a common good. It’s not just about manage an asset but to coordinate and capitalize on the implementation process,” said Pedretti.
Eugenio Petz, head of the Participation and Active Citizenship Office of the municipality of Milano (remotely) focused on the “collaboration agreements”, an administrative tool already used by 800 municipalities in Italy. “We learned from Bologna and very active and also Verona – said Petz. – Collaboration agreements are a tool through which the administration does not carry out its function in an authoritative way, but uses methods of co-planning with interventions inspired by active citizenship”.
The role of citizens who know and live the area is therefore fundamental. And it’s not just a matter of entrusting them with care and management of the greenery, but of arriving at the co-use of spaces and activities that the Administrations would not have had the opportunity to activate. A virtuous network process that also moves on the procurement of resources through the involvement of Foundations and companies looking for shares and “social solidarity” projects.
Finally, the example of urban recovery explained by Renato Quaglia, general director of FOQUS Fondazione Quartieri Spagnoli di Napoli, is unique. A large empty monastery of 15,000 square meters in the heart of Naples it has become a lively place, with new cooperatives, new entrepreneurial activities, and with a large educational cycle, from nursery to lower secondary school, attended by more than 1000 children from zero to 14 years old.
“An experience of urban regeneration – said Quaglia – carried out in one of the most difficult and also emblematic neighborhoods in Europe, because the Spanish Quarters of Naples they are a suburb located in the heart of the historic center of a metropolis”.
Difficulties remain to be overcome. “Today, civic organizations are the new forms of civil commitment in our country. – concluded Quaglia – The urban regeneration experience took place with private resources, tenders, actions of organizations and banking foundations intervened on individual parts of the project. These practices should be within a public path, not in the sense of funding, but in the sense of making them become public policies. Our country is full of regenerative experiences, but they are mostly disconnected from each other and risk being wonderful prime numbers.”