Ancient coastal railway stations in Campania: rehabilitation opportunities and priorities

The construction of the railway from Naples to Portici, the first in Europe launched in 1839, is for the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, the opportunity to contribute, on a European scale, to the definition of the railway station type and organization, giving shape to the territory and influencing the development of human activities. Coastal railway stations in Campania realized in the second half of the ???800, are composed of large waiting rooms for passengers, offices, warehouses and a fully equipped repair laboratories. Despite the obvious conditions of degradation in which these buildings pay today, they are in terms of architecture and urban design, a testament to the process of establishment of the cultural landscape, affecting the built system as well as its social and economical development. The railway station is the merging point between the railway network and the surrounding urban environment; testimony of construction quality and research in design. The paper introduces a new idea of ancient railway stations, not just as infrastructures finalized to transportation. Interventions aimed to rehabilitate existing stations, preserving pieces of a culture of living and building, may give new impetus to urban development through the definition of new compatible functions.