THE URBAN CENTRE AS A VITAL HUB

Stefano Crippa A discussion about growth, vitality, and renewal of urban centres does not mean tackling a sector issue, elitist and limited to small and fortunate territorial areas. On the contrary, it means posing the problem of how to organize harmonious development of the urban centres, large and small, north and south, in our country. It means contemplating a new model of development that includes a clear and definitive role for all the important components of the city area and therefore, taking into serious consideration the topics related to the central areas together with the difficulties in suburban areas, services to residential areas, and access to new outlying hubs of attraction. Contemplating the future of our city centres means stimulating and revaluing a wider process of planning urban development. Stimulating this analysis starting with city centres means starting up a project, beginning with what has to become the beating heart of the city, with a distinctive identity that makes it "unique" and that must maintain the spirit around which to create an entire plan of urban development. From this perspective, we are lucky in Italy. Thousands of years of history marked by independent growth of fiefs, municipalities, and cities has lent each community its own cultural, architectonic, and historic identity with unique customs and habits. This heritage must be the foundation of the renewal process of urban centres. While the idea of urban revitalization can and should be shared with the same enthusiasm by all the municipalities, it is essential to understand that each municipality has to work on its own characteristics, avoiding the risks of homologation that go against the cultural heritage accumulated. By working locally on the historic values and traditions, we can recreate a unique process. Furthermore, we can take action on a living spirit that still pervades our population which is the desire to enjoy beautiful things, live each day to the fullest, and spend time as a community. These habits still belong to our culture, despite the fact that it gets harder each day due to the less and less conducive external conditions. To understand how we are different from our European neighbours, consider that while Dutch, French and German city centres are orderly and closed to vehicle traffic, they are deserted and devoid of life and spirit in the evening. On the contrary, in Italy, the joie de vivre is still expressed in coming together, strolling out of doors, getting a taste of the good things in life. Fertile terrain, on which to build a great project. A grand idea to revitalize city centres, therefore, as an opportunity to start up a process of new urbanization that awards cities a specific and important role. Of course, we have to ask ourselves what the term "urban centre" means. The analysis and consequent response become increasingly complex as the size of the city grows. Given that, as mentioned, every city has to find its own way and therefore its unique definition, looking at the idea in a developed city like Milan, it is difficult to reach a conclusion that identifies a single, unique area, whats more, one that is precisely bounded. We are more likely to identify diverse areas, perhaps each with different characteristics, only one of which would coincide geographically with the centre of the city. The urban centres involved in the revitalization project must be primarily characterized by a strong capacity for attraction toward an external population. This ability can be related to commerce, tourism, entertainment or culture. So, if the zones are different, how can they be interconnected? What is the thread linking them together? What role do institutions have to play in promoting revitalization in a polycentric area like the one described? The concept of a centre in a "network" must emerge in which the identity of the "urban centre" emerges from protection of the characteristics of the individual areas and their potential to provide services to the citizen. The design of the urban centre must be able to build a network that brings together the individual vital areas, promoting development while maintaining unique and distinctive characteristics but also integrating with other areas. Communication, joint cultural initiatives, and exchange of information on city information networks are examples of concrete initiatives that have to fuel the spirit of "network" in order to bring a resurgence of complex urban centres.

An important place in this project must also be set aside for centres with potential development and attractiveness. For instance, former industrial areas undergoing restructuring, future homes to large retail or cultural structures and thus, worthy of joining the urban centre. What can we expect from a project to revitalize urban centres? Certainly not the ability to transmit a concept of functionality to citizens, a role played by suburban retail areas. Restoring vitality to urban centres means designing centres of attraction; it also means offering more and different reasons to come to the city; it means offering a space that can be used by different groups of people with different needs, each that can find satisfaction. Creating a vital centre means Giving an area an artistic and/or cultural attraction with all the complementary services, with museums and associations open on days and at times compatible with the free time of potential visitors; cinemas and theatres would be near to casual and efficient restaurants to make the visit as practical as possible; attractive renovated and well-maintained buildings; policies set up to protect the present historic heritage; Ensuring safety in the streets. Citizens should be able to move around the city in complete safety, but this safety shouldnt generate a quasi police state. Changes must be made so that movement and activity are the very reasons why undesirable visitors move on; Creating a residential context, so that businesses typically catering to local residents, such as small service providers, food shops, etc, can also thrive; Generating a hub with tourist services based on the historic qualities and tourist attractions of the city, promoting tourism connected with events that are supported by an adequate hospitality structure. Tourism comes in many forms - day trips to the city, business trips, and cultural or religious pilgrimages. The vitality of an urban centre must be expressed by qualifying tourism and proposing visits to historic sites as well as to "characteristic" locations, craftsmen's workshops where one can discover traditional arts or the splendid homes that fringe the city. We have to develop tourism with longer stays, to offer the visitor all the aspects of the city and give the city all the economic advantages of the visitors spending. In many cities, developing the economic potential of tourism is still waiting to be discovered and valued. There is still plenty of room for expansion of foreign tourism. One way to increase this tourism is to build up a network of contacts with foreign tour operators to enhance the distinctive qualities of every Italian city and offer particularly attractive conditions for accommodation, entertainment, and finally, shopping, which can be redesigned for the tourist by a better and more complete choice of attractions of the city centre. Developing variegated shopping areas, with famous designers and brand names but also characterised by a small, specialised retail stores that lend special value and identity to the entire centre. An attractive shopping area is more than just large shopping centres, famous names in fashion, and international clothing chains, which are easily reproduced in every city. I am convinced that organized retail plays many roles in this development: it can represent an important area of attraction and a reference point for the tourist; it can drive the initiatives that create atmosphere in the centre; it can be a way to generate ideas that involve the entire retail area; and it can stimulate the public administration to take action to adopt appropriate laws and set up good infrastructure in city centres. It is essential to give ample space to local small businesses, characteristic and historic shops, and cultural spaces that have written "the history of the city". A vital, living centre is one that has created the conditions so that well-run businesses can find their own place and can survive. And this is exactly what we are talking about: an urban centre must have a vigorous group of small shops but the most successful will be the ones that can take on the new critical factors, such as product specialization, association membership, new forms of cooperation and integration with large surfaces, but most of all, the ability to provide high quality services. Viewing the development of urban areas as genuine, open-air shopping centres means believing in a retail model which foresees the co-existence and growth of different areas, very different formulas, but each clearly characterized and able to play a role of attraction to the consumer. Organized retail and small distribution must grow together, each in its differentiation and specialization, to be able to create an actual retail system, in which each has its own space and individual role to the advantage of the customer. The design of a stronger role of the urban centre moves naturally through creation, maintenance

and protection of a series of infrastructure necessary for the complex to develop its potential for attraction. It is essential to maximize its possibility for use by the visitors. Restaurants and hotels must offer high quality services and there must be enough of them to satisfy any form of tourism, all year round; parking facilities must not represent an obstacle for those who come by car and underground structures must supply adequate space to meet the needs of the area; public mass transit must be augmented, especially in particularly crucial days, to satisfy the number of visitors to the centre; tourists or residents who come to the centre have to find shops, banks and currency exchange offices open, even on the weekends. If these stimuli are gathered and organized into a highly developed plan of urban revival, there is no doubt that the entire city will receive a strong impetus toward balanced and focused development, shaped by the desires of the citizens.