Interventi di rigenerazione architettonica, ambientale e identitaria del patrimonio edilizio dei borghi storici / The architectural, environmental and identityforming regeneration of built heritage in historic towns

All those responsible for the process of regenerating and enhancing the heritage to be found in Italian towns should take into account the evidence of climate change and how it threatens ecosystems on Earth, international regulations concerning the pursuit of sustainable development, the new demands of the housing and tourist markets, technological progress and the social changes and needs of contemporary society. The urgent need to mitigate the damaging effects that urban buildings and spaces have on the environment is demanding a great deal of legislative and political reform as well as technical reform with regard to the general redevelopment of existing urban heritage, re-interpreted as a resource, and society viewed in a new light, as community (Ripp, Rodwell, 2016). These requirements and subsequent possible strategies and practices require a particular approach in tackling the enhancement of minor historical town centres, an approach that can combine the interests of economic development with those of the conservation of architectural, landscape and human heritage and local identity. With the 2010 Toledo Declaration, the European Union recognised the importance of urban heritage and detailed the many aspects of governance, economic, social, environmental and cultural sustainability, highlighting the strategic role of integrated urban reclamation undertaken in order to achieve a number of objectives. These objectives include: guaranteeing that citizens and interested parties participate in creating a ‘more sustainable and socially inclusive model in the whole built environment and in all the social fabrics of the existing city’; tackling climate change, demographic changes and mobility, all major urban challenges; as well as ensuring a greater consistency between urban and territorial issues. (Toledo Declaration, 2010).