Unraveling the Agro Pontino's intricate reclamation territory. An example of analysis for understanding its technical architectures and landscapes

Within the framework of the National PhD in Heritage Science, this research will investigate the intricate relations among the different elements that compose the Agro Pontino, reclaimed with a complex, expensive and controversial operation during the 1920s and 30s. These elements belong to different domains, both natural and artificial: from the pathways among the marshes to the roads built during the reclamation; from ancient hydrography to rectified and controlled one; from the so-called ‘lestre’, traditional huts among the marshes, to the first truly modern settlements; from swamps to cultivated fields. A prominent role in the reclamation process was played by the drainage stations scattered over the territory, which, after almost one hundred years, are still in service and allow this vast territory to be habitable and cultivable. The aim is to study the extent to which the buildings of the 1930s have affected the conformation of places and the construction of the landscape over the course of a century, developing a methodology for interpreting the territory – an initial example of which is then presented – that starts from the historical building and, by raising the focus and modifying the scale of the investigation, tries to understand the relationships between different layers, both in a synchronic and diachronic key: the reading can therefore be spatial, but above all it can highlight the historical and historicized relations between all the infrastructures involved, whether natural, artificial and technical or built landscapes. The aim is also to show that historical facilities have a deep connection with the territory and are one of its core elements: their protection, conservation and valorization cannot be separated from that of a broader approach, including the idea of a cultural heritage that, although recent, is actually complex, stratified and, unfortunately, at high level risk, also due to climate change disruptions.