Prototyping Urban Circularity Urban Hubs for Circular Economies

The depletion of the natural resources of the Earth is prompting governments and institutions to adopt strategies and policies inspired by the principles of Circular Economy (COM/2019/640 final; COM/2020/98 final). This latter aims at reducing the withdrawal of natural resources and greenhouse gas emissions thanks to a life cycle-oriented design, so that both biocycle and techno-cycles can feed more extended and interconnected supply chains. On this line, the European Commission placed resource conservation as prime objective for the Union, also focusing on the social engagement as crucial for a successful strategy. According to these remarks, this study implements a method for prototyping a decision process to design a new type of infrastructure for spreading circular economy. The study proposes a network of Circular Hubs to spread circular activities within the city of Naples, mostly located in peri-urban areas, notably in the abandoned spaces (namely wastescapes). The proposal applies to a GIS-based method to identify abandoned sites suitable for hosting the net of urban Circular Hubs. These latter are conceived as multi-functional spaces to place micro and small enterprises apt to carry on circular activities based on redistributing, reselling, repairing and reusing discarded objects. Circular Hubs were designed to be attractive and vibrant spaces where people can meet, interact, and spend time. Most of all, Circular Hubs could be the way by which people can directly experience circularity as a new type of local economies. Circular Hubs are featured for being well designed and attractive to overcome the typical social rejection with respect to the waste management activities and places. According to these remarks, this proposal aims at generating the comprehensive conditions for assuming Circular Hubs as catalysts for contemporary, sustainable, and lively public spaces. The sum of a number of Circular Hubs in the city depicts an integrated network of spaces and activities dedicated to circular economy, providing a sort of social infrastructure for spreading circular practices in the urban life. This study focuses especially on textile products and wood furniture due to the specific potential and constraints related to supply-chains. The proposal works both on urban design and social innovation. It envisions social practice and business opportunity by which discarded objects could be insert into new life cycles or transformed into higher-value products. The case study area is the Western District of Naples, Italy and it acts as pilot for testing the method and to adjust it to be repeated in the city of Ulaanbaatar Mongolia.