The re-appropriation of industrial sites in the urban form of the post-Communist city

The paper purposes to analyse the phenomenon of the re-appropriation of post-communist post-industrial urban sites in the city of Bucharest. The study aims to develop an interpretation of the various conditions, from the technological to the ideological, that has contributed or could contribute to determining the nature of the re-appropriation in terms of both urban memory and functional re-use. Initially, the study will examine specific urban, industrial sites built between the late 19th and early 20th centuries, as function of the industrialization of the Romanian economy, seen in their development in the urban topography. From the middle of the 20th century, these spaces were included in the communist project of growing Romanian industry. Examining the extent of the embodiment of the communist ideologies in projecting a new urban form, the second part of the paper will investigate which was the role of ideology in the process of appropriation and re-appropriation of these industrial sites. In today’s Bucharest a big part of these spaces, lots of them already part of the industrial archaeological patrimony, constitute huge un-used areas blocking the fluidity of the urban tissue. The paper thus asks, can the contemporary re-appropriation of these sites result in an authentic rehabilitation of the urban tissue, generating forms of political praxes that negotiate the various historical layers or appropriation and reappropriation which would mediate different understanding of urban memory and different experiences?