The Self-Made City - Global Rome: Changing Faces of the Eternal City - page 194

of the functioning of the consortia and the execution of the works, the substance
of the matter was that the landowners, through these consortia, were able to self-
manage the execution of the works including the planning stages, prioritization,
the tendering and choice of firms, the execution, quality control, and so on.
in this process, certain organizations were tasked to coordinate and support
the consortia, such as the unione borgate (union of borgate) or the Consorzio
periferie Romane (Consortium for Rome's peripheries). These organizations of-
ten became the direct interlocutors with the city council, intermediaries between
the self-regenerating consortia and the administration. all the decisions of the
consortia relating to the running of the properties, planning, design, and such
were taken in meetings with the landowners. The funds collected were paid into
a bank account controlled by the city council (which authorized the expenditure)
and managed directly by the chairman of the consortium. The city administra-
tion played a role of support, supervision and coordination, and financial guar-
antee, but above all of quality control and approval of projects, effected by means
of rules, guidelines, and public notices explaining the plans and projects.
The experience of the consortia was regarded by several parties, starting
with city government, as a participatory experience. The city council gains con-
siderably from the lightening of its burden of creating and managing works: The
administration is routine and very small-scale and focuses mainly on projects
of particular importance. moreover, the consortia in practice deal with minor
disagreements, thus preventing them from reaching the municipal administra-
tion. but above all, the landowners by and large delegate the running of projects
to the consortia, preferring to take care of their own special interests, like a sort
of large residents' association in a condominium. There were undoubtedly some
aspects of a participative character, but the experiment seemed to be character-
ized mainly by a sort of “shared management,” limited in terms of the ideal of
constructing a “public space” (allegretti and Cellamare 2007).
he Toponimi
The experience of the Consortia for Regeneration was regarded as so important
and effective that the city government extended it to the new unauthorized areas,
the so-called toponomi, not merely for managing the regeneration but also for its
planning. The incidence of unauthorized building was not in fact brought to an
end after the defining of the o Zones' boundaries, nor even after the last amnesty.
he toponimi in Valle borghesiana are emblematic (Cellamare and perin
2010). This is a very extended area (150 ha), situated between the Via Casilina and
the Via prenestina, in Rome's eastern outskirts (18 km along the Via Casilina,
about 7 km outside the Grande Raccordo anulare ring road). it is situated to the
north of the borgata finocchio, another zone with unauthorized building that
is now established. The few services and shops in borgata finocchio (including