Environmental Networks for Smart Territories - Urban Landscapes: Environmental Networks and Quality of Life - page 74

nection networks, the protection of the hydrographical grid, and the defense of
rural space as an essential component in the framework of life of the metro-
politan population ), and the development of the historical/cultural heritage,
both in its expressions of exceptional worth and in the diffuse systems of the
cultural landscape. Overturning the traditional approach, which starts from
open spaces, in particular from what remains of the peri-urban countryside, it
proposes new urban planning and infrastructure directions and new strategies
for sustainable development.
The Marche REM also confronts these themes of contacts between the eco-
logical network and the city . It concretizes the idea of a city penetrated by
environmental networks that communicate with the other networks and con-
nect green areas and white areas, contaminating consolidated fabrics and
undefined city fragments, contributing, together with other infrastructure net-
works, to the definition of the city structure . Projecting environmental net-
works for urban areas can produce important strategies for “ green networks ”
intended as “large parks” [22], within which welfare strategies unfold (Figs.
7.3-7.6).

7.4 Cities and Territories

The city is a fertile element with a vital relationship to the territory. The design
of the city itself cannot make sense if it is incapable of understanding the rela-
tionships with the territorial context :

Fig. 7.3 Umbria, Italy. Environmental networks incorporate ancient rural villages