Changes in Vision - Urban Landscapes: Environmental Networks and Quality of Life - page 56

the sparser the city fabric , the greater the number of smaller spaces. They can
crop up in decommissioned production sites or abandoned agricultural areas;
many of them are available for new uses. From these residual areas (which
could take on the role of new landscape/environmental centrality functional
for the urban machine), it is necessary to start again to reorganize the city,
redefine the degree of centrality, determine new conditions of environmental
continuity through the recognition of the heritage value available, and rewrite
what exists, intervening by controlling relationships that the reuse of each of
these areas could trigger on the local and regional scales .

6.5 Urban Agriculture

If the rapid industrial recovery after the Second World War deepened the
city/country dichotomy, today the rural/agricultural pairing is no longer clear-
ly opposed to the urban/industrial pairing. Indeed, in some cases, the idea of a
happy rural/urban union arises, with forms of urban agriculture located not
only near the city, producing an “ urban countryside ” [19], but also close to
its borders and within it. Urban agriculture is an integrative part of the urban
ecological system and can undertake an important role in the system of urban
environmental management.
The experience of urban agriculture builds on the experience with urban
gardens . These are created with the goal of favoring social aggregation and
the constructive use of free time, recovering a direct and active relationship
with the land and with nature to favor the transmission of natural cultivation
techniques and knowledge. Later, they have also become a first step for the
urban requalification of small areas or large metropolises. There are many
Italian community administrations that have moved in this direction 14 (Fig.
6.4). In the Caserta Territorial Coordination Plan , the social and ecological
value of peri-urban rural areas has been highlighted. Their agricultural func-
tion guarantees a high quality of open space, which, when made available to
its citizens, can contribute decisively to increasing overall urban quality. In
addition, rural spaces, linked to the system of green continuity in the
Naples-Caserta metropolitan area , represent a key resource for the con-
struction of ecological networks in the urban environment:

With objectives linked to the improvement of environmental quality (self-
purification, microclimate regulation, permeability maintenance), biodi-
versity conservation, the promotion of agriculture and urban forests,

14 We have found significant experience with urban gardens promoted by city administrations in:
Alba, Bologna, Bresso (Milan), Cinisello Balsamo (Milan), Florence, Genoa, Milan, Peschiera
Borromeo (Milan), Naples, Padua, Palermo, Pesaro, Pisa, Rimini, Rome, Savona, Turin, and
Saronno (Varese).