I paesaggi ferroviari tra abbandono e riqualificazione

The railways have a “special beauty", punctual and systemic at the same time. On the one hand, infrastructural architectures - like bridges, factories, reservoirs, tunnels – are exemplary works of technical talent which express through essential forms the adherence to the practical function, the coincidence between constructive geometry and abstract mathematical calculation, the wise use of materials according to their nature and costs. On the other, each infrastructural work has an "added value" distinguishing it from other kinds of architectures: it belongs to a complex system of higher scale through which it communicates and affects the quality of inhabited landscape. The recent closure of many old railway lines makes it necessary to define a new design strategy more attentive to the preservation of identity characters, avoiding the homologation of the contemporary landscape. This kind of design strategy proposes the enhancement of railway architectures’ characters, thus avoiding a nostalgic reconstruction of their original form, but working on surviving elements and signs produced by time and looking for an integration between old and new.