Case studies Italy

In this study we assessed the soil quality in two areas in Pisa, one intended to be employed for urban horticulture the other already in use. The not cultivated area (via Norvegia) showed a heterogeneity due to its peculiar history: according to what some residents remember, filling soil have been distributed on the southern part of the area. The cultivated area (CEP) showed heterogeneous chemical characteristics, probably due to different techniques of cultivation in particular related to the use of Cu-fungicides. Many studies point out the potential risk of contamination by metals for vegetables grown in urban areas and the lack of site-specific risk assessment for this topic. We analysed the metal content in the soils: because of the metal low values founded and the sub-alkaline pH the possible translocation into the vegetable tissues is negligible. Copper concentration in some samples of CEP soil, probably due to the massive use for controlling fungus diseases, highlighted the possible accumulation of this metal in the soil, eventually damaging the microbial biodiversity and fauna. The overall soil data showed a low fertile soil, poor in organic matter and structure, while horticulture needs rich and well structured. If the urban gardeners are not aware, this problem can lead to an excessive use of chemicals, degrading further the properties of soil and bring to the production of unhealthy vegetables. During the project a questionnaire have been distributed to put in relation the environmental results with the awareness of the urban allotments gardeners. What we found out is a real discrepancy between the intentions and the actions, as many gardeners declare to go for organic cultivation and at the same time to use chemicals. The results of the study suggest that the unaware cultivation did not improve the quality of soil and to consider the importance of surveying the properties of soils and its global quality before planning the areas for cultivating food in urban areas, and subsequently to educate the urban gardeners to the sustainable cultivation techniques: re-integration of soil organic matter and organic cultivation technique. During the project a professional photographic shooting have been carried out, and the exhibition  was organized.

Urban gardening developed in Rome as a reaction to the unequal distribution of available green spaces in large and densely populated areas of the city, and to the lack of care for the already existing ones. It includes diverse forms of residual or mismanaged green spaces re-appropriation and management put forward by local dwellers, with the aim of providing the city with a larger number of accessible and interactive public gardens.

Since 2006, a large number of associations and informal citizens groups have started to engage in collective gardening, and the movement is rapidly growing, by performing both Guerrilla Gardening-style actions and long-lasting community gardens projects run by local associations. The reclamation of derelict areas to be restored as green public space lead people to experience new and unexpected social relationships and place attachment, provides communities with a sense of purpose and togetherness, and with the joy of caring for the living space (Zappata Romana, 2011). Today, more than 150 community gardens, vegetable gardens and permanent Guerrilla Gardening spots exist in Rome.

In this project gardening initiatives in Rome are regarded as informal urban planning practices and the urbanistic work of the Zappata Romana association (Cioli, D’Eusebio 2011), working as collector and interpreter of urban gardening movement in Rome, is especially considered by including significant examples of collective gardens creation (Parco del Forte Prenestino, Hortus Urbis…) and by analyzing the movement’s influence on formal planning activity (Piano Regolatore, new calls for gardening initiatives…).

This social and spatial transformation that is currently affecting Rome by turning most of its urban voids and interstitial spaces into places for collective enjoyment thank to the spontaneous engagement of local dwellers. It presents evidences documenting the accidental character of most public space in Rome (UT 2011) and describes the principal reasons leading many inhabitants to engage in alternative space-planning initiatives (Oecumene 2013) that in few years gave raise to a vibrant social and spatial panorama, aimed at contrasting the lack of an efficient formal planning and the hegemony of building lobbies. Particularly, the erasure of public spaces induces the loss of civic culture, the political disaffection and the sense of insecurity, especially in the peripheries, and generates a yawning gap between the wealthy and disenfranchised. Amongst the other, public green spaces (parks, gardens, villas…), while largely present in Rome (green space encompasses approximately 68% of the total urban surface), are severely downgraded by the unequal distribution and the lack of care that turn most of them into unpleasant and desolated areas (Cioli, D’Eusebio, 2011).

While traditionally appropriated by place-shaping accidental practices (UT 2011), including self-help settlements or other private uses (vegetable growing, damping, storing, unauthorized selling activities…), in the recent years urban derelict areas have been increasingly occupied by the mushrooming of politically- and socially-sounds initiatives intentionally aimed at complementing (or sometime contrasting) official planning. This new phenomenon can be defined as ‘informal planning’ (Becker 2013); i.e. a form of political agency calling for a collective re-interpretation of the society and space relationship, via multiple and spontaneous planning practices that organise the structure and functioning of the city space in absence of legal definition, guidance and founds provided by the government bodies or business sector.

The results of the case-based exploration (conducted by field work including transect walks, on-the site interviews with key actors, media coverage monitoring and participation in gardening initiatives) are reported and discussed in order to consider:

1. weather urban gardening in Rome - as a specific form of informal urban planning - is able to make evident some of the most relevant spatial issues determined by peculiar social, political and environmental conditions in the different areas of the city:
2. how an alternative bottom-up and loosely structured public participation in planning is carried out by Zappata Romana association (inviting traditionally prominent stakeholders to take part in the processes rather than in following them);
3. what innovative forms of intervention for the creation and maintenance of urban public space have been already realised or are suggested by urban gardening movement in Rome; and how they can work as complementary mode of planning and prefigures new trajectories.

Cioli S, d’Eusebio L (2011) Zappata romana!. L’architetto italiano, 42:20-22

Becker J. et al. (2013), Self Made Urbanism Rome S.M.U.R., NGBK exibition, Berlin 14. September - 3. November 2013

Oecumene: Citizenship after Orientalism (2013), Erc Project. Available at: www.oecumene.eu

Urban Transcripts - UT (2011)”Rome, the accidental city

Zappata Romana (2011) Come fare un orto o un giardino condiviso. Available at: www.zappataromana.net