CROSS-SCALE ANALYSES FOR COSTAL AREAS MANAGEMENT: THE CASE STUDY OF THE SORRENTINE PENINSULA

The paper focus on the resilience of coastal areas on the case study of the Sorrento Peninsula. This is an outstanding example of Mediterranean landscape where the anthropogenic uses have historically shaped the natural environment. Here, the instances of landscape protection leads toward an innovative design approach based on a site-specific knowledge, and on the selection of more appropriate land-uses. The research focus especially goes to the morphological patterns generated by a set of selected iconemi (Turri, 1998). These are elementary units for the landscape perception, a set of single, special components whose combination forms the image of the place and its identity. The study develops a multiscaling design approach in order to depict the coastal landscape as a sum of morphological patterns and iconemi. Further, the study aims at understanding landscape diversity (also referred to the local eco-social system and its constraints), looking at the specific configuration of the place, its vulnerability, and its exposure at risk. The research especially focused on the fire-risk and on the site accessibility, enhancing the needs of recovering the agricultural paths as a secondary access network. The study identifies these pathways as the special iconema of the former agricultural ecosystems. The latter were interpreted as the most effective tool for governing land use change locally, enhancing the role of the slope crops in terms of their environmental values and economic potential, looking at new agricultural uses as a key action for risk reduction, increasing paths recovery as part of the wider adaptive strategy in case of fire events.