Plan for the reconstruction of Castelnuovo all’Aquila after the earthquake of 2009

The work, after the tragic earthquake of 2009, took the opportunity to develop alongside the themes of the restoration of buildings and the re-qualification of the urban environment an articulated series of experiences regarding the dwelling and environmental fabric of the Municipality of San Pio delle Camere, in Castelnuovo, under the guidance of Professor Alberto Breschi and other colleagues expert in the fields of urban planning and design, restoration and consolidation.

The operative programme was carried out in three phases:
a) cognitive analysis
b) feasibility hypotheses
c) the project synthesis for a rehabilitation project
The experiences were activated on the entire built nucleus of Castelnuovo based on themes agreed upon with the Administration and taking into account the programmes and specific needs of the Administration itself. The starting point was provided by the studies which had been previously carried out by the Department of Civil Engineering of the Faculty of Engineering of the University of Florence, under the guidance of Professor Vignoli, and which generated the themes relative to the urban settlement of Castelnuovo. The methodology and the content of the research carried out in the Laboratories followed the scheme below, organised into an analytic phase which included feasibility studies regarding the intervention hypotheses at the different scales and in the development of specific design proposals.
a) Analysis
The cognitive approach included the historical, urban and environmental analyses.
The knowledge of the place was a fundamental moment in the design process; only through it was it possible to discover the most intimate connotations, the processes of formation and transformation through time, the various usages and meanings, and grasping in particular the latent potentialities.
b) Hypothesis of feasibility
For every section object of investigation the various intervention vocations were defined at the various scales (urban, architectural and functional), comparing the possible transformation alternatives and defining the adequate intervention degrees.
c) Synthesis of the project as proposed for a rehabilitation plan
The synthesis of the project constituted the conclusive result (2nd phase) of the process of analysis and hypothesis. It was materialised into “proposals”, exemplary in their methodological completeness, with specific intervention indications for every previously chosen example.